Ukulele, mummy, karaoke: What do they have in common? These are three of just 12 nouns selected for their “surprising stories.”
In this rather slim volume about linguistic cross-fertilization, the author uses almost more words in his adult-oriented introduction and closing note than he provides for young readers. The format presents phonetic pronunciation, original language, original and English definitions, and a brief history for each word. While the historical anecdotes are interesting, this does not really add up to much of a book. The accomplished, striking, and vividly colored two-page spreads that cunningly work each word into the overall design of an illustration are the real draw. Ukulele means “jumping flea” in the original language, Hawaiian. The name was given to the instruments Hawaiians fashioned after seeing “small guitars brought by European settlers….A ukulele player’s fingers bounce on the strings as quickly as jumping fleas.” In the picture, a band of orangey-brown fleas all bedecked in leis play ukuleles. Questions go unanswered. The entry for “mummy” doesn’t quite explain how the Persian word for “wax” came to be applied to the special Egyptian method of preserving bodies. “Karaoke” means “empty orchestra” in Japanese. The explanation mentions that the “first karaoke machines were developed in Japan” but doesn’t indicate when. The color key locating language families is difficult to correlate with the unlabeled map.
Striking illustrations cannot redeem these lackluster etymologies.
(Informational picture book. 8-11)