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In 1899, James Monroe Munyon of Philadelphia married an inhaler to a nasal
douche to make a remarkable device: a tube that you stuck up one nostril,
clearing your blocked nose by blowing vapour up it. In Ohio, Benjamin Atkins
tried to improve a pianist’s touch by devising a metal trap that held fingers at
the correct angle. Then there was the safety chain that nearly killed someone on
its first use, Rudolf Diesel’s attempt to run engines on coal dust, the dotty
search for perpetual motion—and the list goes on. Adam Hart-Davis has
gathered together some of these near misses in Eurekaaargh!. A brilliant rummage
through the attics of the mind. Published by Michael O’Mara, £9.99, ISBN
1854794841.