Charlie Farquharson's Unyverse

Robert J. Sawyer is a Toronto-based free-lance writer.

Charlie Farquharson is the comedic alter ego of actor Don Harron. This
book was inspired by a show at Toronto’s McLaughlin Planetarium. The
entire volume is written in Farquharsonese, so it’s best taken in
small doses: “I jist giv yiz a Grantoor of our own soler sistern.”
To make matters worse, the book’s body copy is set in an unusual
(albeit Canadian-designed) typeface called Albertan, which sports a
bizarre s-t ligature that bullies the eye.

There is real science here: Charlie explains many things, including the
difference between comets and meteors, why the world-colliding theories
of Immanuel Velikovsky have been discredited, and the work of British
physicist Stephen Hawking. Because Charlie can’t spell, footnotes had
to be provided explaining who “Vellykosky” and “Steevin Hocking”
are. Although designed to be educational, the book is probably best
enjoyed simply as a work of humor by those who already know the
informational content. It’s profusely illustrated with line drawings
and black-and-white photos. There’s no index, and the table of
contents is almost unreadable, with chapter numbers that look like page
numbers. Charlie Farquharson’s Unyverse is fun, but mostly as a
curiosity or as a souvenir of the original planetarium show.