A solid yet playful tour of the huckster’s world.
Schroeder unfurls eight stellar scams—perpetrated from the Philippines to your Phillips radio—that shook the gullible for all they were worth.
As long as you are not on the receiving end, scams are enormously entertaining. Here readers learn of the Tasaday deception, the 18th-century Shakespeare fraud (with its sad father-son conflict), Orson Welles’ radio hysteria (said Orson: “Every true artist must, in his own way, be a magician, a charlatan”), along with plenty of plain old swindles serving as cautionary tales that we may never learn from, as greed, need and desperation always have the upper hand. What makes Schroeder’s presentation of these bamboozlements so pleasurable—other than the gotcha! factor—is the clarity of his narrative, the unhurried exploration of the dupe and the fact that the only things that get hurt here are egos and pocketbooks. He has also chosen the fleecings for their color—of the P.T. Barnum sort—rather than the darker work of Enron or no-bid military contracts. Simard’s accompanying artwork lays out in grayscale the raw bones of the flimflams, driving home the salient moments when the ruse worked and then when things went south.
A solid yet playful tour of the huckster’s world. (Nonfiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-55451-351-2
Page Count: 158
Publisher: Annick Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2011
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care.
In 1977, the oil carrier Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of oil into a formerly pristine Alaskan ocean inlet, killing millions of birds, animals, and fish. Despite a cleanup, crude oil is still there.
The Winters foretold the destructive powers of the atomic bomb allusively in The Secret Project (2017), leaving the actuality to the backmatter. They make no such accommodations to young audiences in this disturbing book. From the dark front cover, on which oily blobs conceal a seabird, to the rescuer’s sad face on the back, the mother-son team emphasizes the disaster. A relatively easy-to-read and poetically heightened text introduces the situation. Oil is pumped from the Earth “all day long, all night long, / day after day, year after year” in “what had been unspoiled land, home to Native people // and thousands of caribou.” The scale of extraction is huge: There’s “a giant pipeline” leading to “enormous ships.” Then, crash. Rivers of oil gush out over three full-bleed wordless pages. Subsequent scenes show rocks, seabirds, and sea otters covered with oil. Finally, 30 years later, animals have returned to a cheerful scene. “But if you lift a rock… // oil / seeps / up.” For an adult reader, this is heartbreaking. How much more difficult might this be for an animal-loving child?
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care. (author’s note, further reading) (Informational picture book. 9-12)Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3077-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
A hardworking addition to U.S. history shelves.
In 1776, some of the most respected men in Great Britain’s American Colonies signed the Declaration of Independence, a revolutionary—but not necessarily transparent—document.
Although the declaration is one of the key documents of American history, its sometimes-archaic language may mystify young citizens of the 21st century. After a few pages of introductory information that describes the conflicts faced by colonists before the Revolutionary War, this effort presents the declaration line by line, explaining the concepts, defining confusing words and ideas, and illuminating the intent of the signers in the context of the time. Occasionally, in sections headed “Think Deeper,” the author asks pointed, thoughtful questions on a variety of issues that have never been fully resolved in the past 245 years, without devolving into revisionist history. The format places original text on verso with the translation on recto, but clever design keeps readers engaged. The double-page spreads are neatly laid out, many including portraits of Founding Fathers presented against appealing, brightly colored backgrounds that vary from spread to spread. A variety of maps, cartoon characters, and period illustrations extend the text. With a reading level appropriate to the upper grade schoolers who are often introduced to this tumultuous period of history, this engaging and surprisingly entertaining effort seems like the perfect choice to accompany and expand lesson plans. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A hardworking addition to U.S. history shelves. (bibliography) (Nonfiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-638190-48-6
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Bushel & Peck Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2021
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