Incomplete and written too soon to be useful.
Looks at the spread, U.S. government response, and impact on daily life of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Near the end of 2019, a highly contagious novel coronavirus strain was believed to have jumped from a bat or a pangolin to a human in a wet market in the Chinese city of Wuhan, leading to a worldwide pandemic. Written in the past tense just a few months into the crisis, the book uses information available through May 2020, making it a record of the early effects of this quickly changing situation. Anecdotes about the cancellation of major life events such as proms and baseball games and the difficulties of online schooling demonstrate the day-to-day effects on individuals, but important context—such as emerging scientific understanding of how the virus is spread—is often missing. There is no mention of anti-mask agitators or those who believe the virus is a hoax or political ploy. Quoting mainly voices from the U.S., even when discussing the situation abroad, the disproportionate impact of Covid-19 on Black, Indigenous, and communities of color is not mentioned. The cover image shows a woman of East Asian descent with a stethoscope dressed in personal protective equipment, but the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes is never discussed. Wet markets, which exist worldwide, including in the U.S., are presented as an Asian phenomenon.
Incomplete and written too soon to be useful. (source notes, resources, further reading, index, photo credits) (Nonfiction. 12-15)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-6782-0018-3
Page Count: 80
Publisher: ReferencePoint Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2020
Cogent of topic, but for readability, it’s aptly titled.
In urgent tones, a call for action as climate change and continuing waste and pollution of available fresh water pose imminent threats to human health and agriculture.
Drawing from recently published reports and news stories, Kallen paints an alarming picture. Aquifers are being sucked dry by large-scale agriculture, lake levels are falling, and water sources above- and belowground are being polluted. Though he points to a few significant counterefforts—the Clean Water Act (1972) in the United States and local initiatives elsewhere, such as “rainwater harvesting” ponds in India and Kenya—these come off as spotty responses that are often hobbled by political and corporate foot-dragging. He also points to shrinking glaciers and snow packs (plus, for added gloom, superstorms like Sandy) as harbingers of climate change that will lead to widespread future disaster. Aside from occasional incidents or examples and rare if telling photos, though, this jeremiad is largely composed of generalities and big numbers—not a formula for motivating young readers. Nor does the author offer budding eco-activists much in the way of either hope or ways to become part of the solution; for the latter, at least, Cathryn Berger Kaye’s Going Blue: A Teen’s Guide to Saving Our Oceans, Lakes, Rivers, & Wetlands (2010) is a better choice.
Cogent of topic, but for readability, it’s aptly titled. (source notes, multimedia resource lists, index) (Nonfiction. 12-14)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4677-2646-7
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Twenty-First Century/Lerner
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2014
A bare-bones introduction for readers without a pre-existing interest.
A quick history of hacking, from the “phone phreaks” of the 1960s to today’s attacks on commercial data stores large and small.
Drawing solely from previously published reports and documents, the authors paint an alarming picture (“The internet has become a cyber criminal playground”) as they trace the growth of increasingly sophisticated digital attacks on personal, corporate and government data systems. Though they rightly point out that many hackers, from early “phreaks” like Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak on, have been motivated more by the pleasures of creating software or high-tech gear (or, as they acknowledge in the case of Edward Snowden, idealism) than criminal intent, most of the incidents they describe involve theft or espionage. Noting that attacks can come from anywhere in the world and that malware can be secretly installed not just on computers, but on any number of gadgets, the authors project little hope of keeping our information safe from bad guys. Nor do they offer more than, at best, bare mention of firewalls, encryption, two-step verification, strong passwords and other protective countermeasures. Still, readers will at least come away more aware of the range of hazards, from phishing and ransomware to botnets and distributed denial of service, as well as the huge, rapidly increasing amounts of money and data shadowy entities are raking in.
A bare-bones introduction for readers without a pre-existing interest. (source notes, bibliography, further reading, index) (Nonfiction. 12-14)Pub Date: April 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4677-2512-5
Page Count: 72
Publisher: Twenty-First Century/Lerner
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2014
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