Grab your nose plugs and your safety goggles before you wade into this repugnant offering from the Awesome, Disgusting Careers series (6 titles). Plumbers, sewer inspectors, portable toilet cleaners, wastewater treatment operators, hazmat divers, septic tank servicers, and ocean cleanup workers all get their due in this survey of gross but essential jobs. The book strikes a good balance of playing up the jobs' fetid features and tipping its hat to those that choose to work in these industries. Appropriately abhorrent photos show workers on the job, and comical cartoons are replete with acid-green fumes, rats, and flies. Closing critical-thinking questions invite further engagement with the text. Even if readers have no desire to try one of these jobs themselves, it will leave them feeling grateful to those who do.
