At first glance, this looks like an ABC book, but the alphabet plays a distant second to a combination gazetteer and cultural geography. Each of 26 countries is covered in a spread that includes a greeting in the appropriate language, a map, and several full-color photographs of children in typical settings and situations; the result is an encounter with the local dress, transportation, and architecture, as well as a glimpse of the work and play of children. Ajmera and Versola offer a gold mine of interesting national nuggets—that Zimbabwe means ``stone houses,'' that girls and women in Yemen decorate their hands with swirls of henna, that Budapest is really two cities, Buda and Pest, split by the Danube—and include concise regional and ethnic histories, with X standing for the ``imaginary'' country of Xanadu. A short fact sheet for every country relays one particularly fascinating item: the proportion of children to the population as a whole, giving readers instant understanding of population pyramids, e.g., Russia has 34 million children out of an overall population of 147 million, while Oman has 1 million children in a population of 2 million. A pleasing and hopeful book—sugar-coated as it may be—with a feel-good global outlook. (Nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-88106-999-X
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
Trickling, bubbling, swirling, rushing, a river flows down from its mountain beginnings, past peaceful country and bustling city on its way to the sea. Hooper (The Drop in My Drink, 1998, etc.) artfully evokes the water’s changing character as it transforms from “milky-cold / rattling-bold” to a wide, slow “sliding past mudflats / looping through marshes” to the end of its journey. Willey, best known for illustrating Geraldine McCaughrean’s spectacular folk-tale collections, contributes finely detailed scenes crafted in shimmering, intricate blues and greens, capturing mountain’s chill, the bucolic serenity of passing pastures, and a sense of mystery in the water’s shadowy depths. Though Hooper refers to “the cans and cartons / and bits of old wood” being swept along, there’s no direct conservation agenda here (for that, see Debby Atwell’s River, 1999), just appreciation for the river’s beauty and being. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0792-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
Nolen and Nelson offer a smaller, but no less gifted counterpart to Big Jabe (2000) in this new tall tale. Shortly after being born one stormy night, Rose thanks her parents, picks a name, and gathers lightning into a ball—all of which is only a harbinger of feats to come. Decked out in full cowboy gear and oozing self-confidence from every pore, Rose cuts a diminutive, but heroic figure in Nelson’s big, broad Western scenes. Though she carries a twisted iron rod as dark as her skin and ropes clouds with fencing wire, Rose overcomes her greatest challenge—a pair of rampaging twisters—not with strength, but with a lullaby her parents sang. After turning tornadoes into much-needed rain clouds, Rose rides away, “that mighty, mighty song pressing on the bull’s-eye that was set at the center of her heart.” Throughout, she shows a reflective bent that gives her more dimension than most tall-tale heroes: a doff of the Stetson to her and her creators. (author’s note) (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-15-216472-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Silver Whistle/Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2003
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