William Gurstelle is an American nonfiction author, magazine writer, and inventor. He is a feature columnist for Make Magazine and the Pyrotechnics and Ballistics Editor at Popular Mechanics

Popular Mechanics

Popular Mechanics is an American magazine first published January 11, 1902 by H. H. Windsor, and has been owned since 1958 by the Hearst Corporation...

 Magazine.

He is also the author of several science “how-to” books published by Crown Books/Random House

Random House

Random House, Inc. is the largest general-interest trade book publisher in the world. It has been owned since 1998 by the German private media corporation Bertelsmann and has become the umbrella brand for Bertelsmann book publishing. Random House also has a movie production arm, Random House Films,...

 and Chicago Review Press.
His best known work is Backyard Ballistics, which according to Newsweek Magazine, has sold hundreds of thousands of copies Other popular titles are Absinthe and Flamethrowers, and The Art of the Catapult. In 2011, Publishers Weekly stated Gurstelle had sold more than 300,000 of his books have been sold.

According to James A. Buczynski in Library Journal

Library Journal

Library Journal is a trade publication for librarians. It was founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey . It reports news about the library world, emphasizing public libraries, and offers feature articles about aspects of professional practice...

, Gurstelle's writing "balances scientific explanations of the technologies with profiles of the people who [explore] them."

External links

• Building A Catapult
• New York Times Book Review - Absinthe and Flamethrowers
• Wall Street Journal - Mythbuster's Adam Savage on The Practical Pyromaniac