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PRAY you never have a day as hellish as this. Within 16 hours, the hero of this book gets a computer virus, squirts raw chilli juice in his eye and breaks his toe, little finger and front tooth, among other mishaps. The consolation for us is that every calamity illustrates more science, such as why milk goes putrid, or why diesel ruins petrol cars. None of the science is groundbreaking – everyday wonders get preference – but it makes for novel reading. It’s stream-of-consciousness science, as if Leopold Bloom from James Joyce’s Ulysses was a clumsy but observant engineer.