Just Like Rube Goldberg: The Incredible True Story of the Man Behind the Machines

In opening pages, Aronson describes artist and inventor Rube Goldberg: “In a funny way, his life was just like one of his famous inventions: an improbable and inefficient chain reaction that ends up making perfect sense.” As a child, shy Goldberg immersed himself in drawing, but when his parents didn’t support his plans to become a cartoonist, he studied engineering, then quit his steady job to follow his dream and embrace an alter ego. Aronson reveals Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts, “who invented one intricate machine after another.” Neubecker’s idiosyncratic art depicts several of Professor Butts’s contraptions—one that elaborately punches holes in doughnuts, another that turns off a light. Readers will enjoy Goldberg’s brilliantly impractical inventions and nutty personality. Ages 3–8. [em](Mar.) [/em]