Color: A Natural History of the Palette Book

The disclaimers "I imagine", "perhaps", "possibly", "it could be that" appear in this NON-FICTION book far more times than they should.

While I liked the content of about three-quarters of the book, it infuriated me at times when the author would suddenly start presenting the material through the eyes of a character, "imagining" their experiences, travels, and accomplishments. This first rears its head around page 81, when the tone of her book changes to speculate about an imaginary Corinthian artist. I quote...

"But what if she became tired of using just one variety of paint material? Perhaps, I thought, she may have tried out new blacks and browns. Would she, given the chance to try out charcoal's successors, have preferred lead pencils or India ink? Would she have dyed her clothes deepest black, or was it only in the palest of classical robes that she wanted to be seen? And if her boyfriend ever returned to Greece between voyages, would she have used her new knowledge of pigments to decorate her own face for the occasion? I imagined our heroine experimenting idly with mascaras and liners."

At this point, I threw the book across the room.

WHAT THE HELL. It's mean to be a scholarly book about color... and I'm reading a bullshit paragraph leading me into speculation about "this Corinthian woman's" dating and make-up?

I felt the same way about her handling of the character of Martinengo in the "Orange" chapter. On one two page spread, I think I counted "I imagine", "perhaps", "possibly", "if", about ten or twelve times.
This is an irresponsibly stupid way to write nonfiction. Two stars (and I never want to read anything else by her).