Lightning doesn’t strike twice for the award-winning team of So You Want To Be President? (2000). Seeking to inspire young readers who like to “tinker with machines that clink and clank, levers that pull, bells that ring, cogs that grind, switches that turn on and off, wires that vibrate, dials that spin,” St. George reels off anecdotal, relentlessly exclamatory introductions to dozens of American and European inventors, from Gutenberg to Goodyear, George Washington to Clarence Birdseye. All of them, however, are dead, only three are women, and only two are nonwhite, so though their paths to success were diverse, as role models the people mentioned here make a limited gallery. Small mixes impressionistic renditions of featured inventions with freely drawn caricatures of their creators. As the overall visual tone is genial—even Joseph Guillotin is depicted proudly polishing his eponymous device as an anxious-looking matron is being positioned on it—the grim scene of ranked slaves feeding Whitney’s cotton gin brings a sudden dissonance that pays no more than lip service to the less salutary effects of the industrial revolution. The author finishes with an exhortation to break barriers that children of different cultural or racial backgrounds (not to mention girls) may find unconvincing, considering the examples offered, and closes with biographical notes on some—not all—of the names she’s dropped in the main text. The brief bibliography is a list of what may charitably be described as classic titles. Will this give some budding inventors that fire in the belly? Perhaps—but not as reliably as Don Wulffson’s Toys! Amazing Stories Behind Some Great Inventions (2000) or Nathan Aaseng’s thematic collective biographies. (Nonfiction. 8-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-399-23593-0
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2002
Friends of these pollinators will be best served elsewhere.
This book is buzzing with trivia.
Follow a swarm of bees as they leave a beekeeper’s apiary in search of a new home. As the scout bees traverse the fields, readers are provided with a potpourri of facts and statements about bees. The information is scattered—much like the scout bees—and as a result, both the nominal plot and informational content are tissue-thin. There are some interesting facts throughout the book, but many pieces of trivia are too, well trivial, to prove useful. For example, as the bees travel, readers learn that “onion flowers are round and fluffy” and “fennel is a plant that is used in cooking.” Other facts are oversimplified and as a result are not accurate. For example, monofloral honey is defined as “made by bees who visit just one kind of flower” with no acknowledgment of the fact that bees may range widely, and swarm activity is described as a springtime event, when it can also occur in summer and early fall. The information in the book, such as species identification and measurement units, is directed toward British readers. The flat, thin-lined artwork does little to enhance the story, but an “I spy” game challenging readers to find a specific bee throughout is amusing.
Friends of these pollinators will be best served elsewhere. (Informational picture book. 8-10)Pub Date: May 18, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-500-65265-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Thames & Hudson
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The author of Cod’s Tale (2001) again demonstrates a dab hand at recasting his adult work for a younger audience. Here the topic is salt, “the only rock eaten by human beings,” and, as he engrossingly demonstrates, “the object of wars and revolutions” throughout recorded history and before. Between his opening disquisition on its chemical composition and a closing timeline, he explores salt’s sources and methods of extraction, its worldwide economic influences from prehistoric domestication of animals to Gandhi’s Salt March, its many uses as a preservative and industrial product, its culinary and even, as the source for words like “salary” and “salad,” its linguistic history. Along with lucid maps and diagrams, Schindler supplies detailed, sometimes fanciful scenes to go along, finishing with a view of young folk chowing down on orders of French fries as ghostly figures from history look on. Some of Kurlansky’s claims are exaggerated (the Erie and other canals were built to transport more than just salt, for instance), and there are no leads to further resources, but this salutary (in more ways than one) micro-history will have young readers lifting their shakers in tribute. (Picture book/nonfiction. 8-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-399-23998-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2006
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