"The Purple Mistake - The failed malaria cure that colored the victorian world" tells the serendipitous story of William Perkin. In 1856, the 18-year-old chemistry student was trying to synthesize quinine to cure malaria in the British colonies. Instead, he produced a black, sticky sludge from coal tar. Before throwing it away, he noticed it stained his rag a brilliant, fast shade of purple. Science writer Oliver Trent chronicles how this accident birthed the synthetic dye industry. Before Perkin, purple was the color of kings, derived from rare snails. After Perkin, "Mauveine" became a global craze, accessible to the masses. The book traces how the chemical factories built for dye were later repurposed for explosives and pharmaceuticals (like Bayer and BASF). "The Purple Mistake" is a micro-history of unintended consequences. It illustrates how a teenage lab accident ended nature's monopoly on color and launched the modern chemical age, changing fashion and medicine forever.