by Moe Zilla

Created on: October 13, 2010

Professor Olaf invents machines, "some of which were useful and some of which were not," but one day he invented a machine which was "incredible". I love how this book plays delves into that cool mystique of being a tinkerer, and I'm guessing everyone dreams of inventing something sooner or later. Nicholas Brennan spent two and a half years writing "Olaf's Incredible Machine" (according to the book's jacket), so maybe he's really telling the story of his own desire to create some spectacular. Brennan describes himself as an "aging child prodigy," and I want to believe he took extra pride in "Olaf's Incredible Machine."

The book's title page shows steam coming out of the brass whistle on a bellows tube with a long, complicated tube. And when the machine is first unveiled, it shines brightly under the yellow light in Olaf's dusty tinkerer's lab. The illustrations are gorgeous, with clear, detailed sketches and some bright, carefully-chosen colors. But unfortunately for Olay, the only thing that incredible machine could do was... grow!

"Every night Olaf fed it coal and paraffin; and every morning he would find that the machine had sprouted more pipes and funnels and more gauges and levers." Eventually Olaf has to build houses for extra workers to live in to continue feeding his machine, as it spews smoke and fumes across the city. Soon the machine is too big, and the workmen are all ignoring Olaf, so he decides to abandon them altogether, and escapes the city by flying on a fancy balloon that he's loaded with plants and animals. And then Brennan simply stops narrating the story, and switches over to a beautiful illustration of the view from Olaf's balloon.

The book was written in 1973, and it's interesting to wonder if Brennan is offering a cynical countercultural comment on society itself. "The plants began to grow in the fresh air," Brennan writes, "and the animals thrived." So Olaf builds more balloon vehicles, "and his balloon-land grew larger and larger." A boy in the city eventually climbs up to the balloon-land on one plant's amazingly long root. "Before long there was nobody left below in the town.

"And the incredible machine at last came to a stop because there was no one to look after it and no one to feed it with coal and paraffin."

But ironically, Olaf's balloon-land eventually crashes to the earth - completely covering the cities with his green floating paradise. It's a wonderful story that, surprisingly, ends up by traveling in a complete circle. The world is back to the way it started before the arrival of the incredible machine.  And then Olaf begins to think about what his next invention should be....

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