Overall, a winning tribute to a scientific dreamer who was both a man of his times and, often, well ahead of them.
A searching portrait of the troubled, visionary Serbian-American inventor, with simple hands-on projects that touch on his life and interests.
O’Quinn describes in some detail the achievements for which Tesla is best remembered—from the Tesla coil and the practical generation of AC electricity to an advanced type of turbine—as well as his conflicts with Thomas Edison and Guglielmo Marconi. She promotes him as both a pacifist (notwithstanding his visions of particle-beam superweapons) and a conservationist whose experiments with wireless power transmission were spurred at least in part by environmental concerns. Without psychologizing she also notes his secretive nature, his tendencies to live beyond his means and to con investors, his now-disturbing eugenics theories, and his nomadic last years as a reclusive urban pigeon feeder. Period photos and patent drawings depict the hawk-nosed inventor, his work, his rivals, and his friends, and there are further resources aplenty at the end for curious or tantalized readers. Young experimenters hoping to fire up megavolt blasts of sparks or light bulbs held in their bare hands as Tesla did will be disappointed by the inserted projects, which begin with generating static electricity on a balloon and go on to demonstrations of magnetic fields and electromagnetism, writing an autobiography, and suchlike depressingly nonhazardous activities.
Overall, a winning tribute to a scientific dreamer who was both a man of his times and, often, well ahead of them. (index, timeline, endnotes) (Biography. 11-13)Pub Date: July 9, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-912777-21-4
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
In this glossy photo essay, the author briefly recounts the study and exploration of the moon, beginning with Stonehenge and concluding with the 1998–99 unmanned probe, Lunar Prospector. Most of the dramatic photographs come from NASA and will introduce a new generation of space enthusiasts to the past missions of Project Mercury, Gemini, and most especially the moon missions, Apollo 1–17. There are plenty of photographs of various astronauts in space capsules, space suits, and walking on the moon. Sometimes photographs are superimposed one on another, making it difficult to read. For example, one photograph shows the command module Columbia as photographed from the lunar module and an insert shows the 15-layer space suit and gear Neil Armstrong would wear for moonwalking. That’s a lot to process on one page. Still, the awesome images of footprints on the moon, raising the American flag, and earthrise from the moon, cannot help but raise shivers. The author concludes with a timeline of exploration, Web sites, recommended books, and picture credits. For NASA memorabilia collectors, end papers show the Apollo space badges for missions 11–17. Useful for replacing aging space titles. (Nonfiction. 8-11)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 1-57091-408-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
More a historical narrative than a character portrait, this account of Tecumseh’s efforts to create a tribal confederacy in the Old Northwest focuses on the great Shawnee leader’s many battles and negotiations with then–Territorial Governor William Henry Harrison and then his disastrous—ultimately fatal—alliance with the British during the War of 1812. Replete with side essays on such varied subtopics as the Northwest Territory, the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-12 and the Battle of Lake Erie, it also boasts often–full-color illustrations from archival sources (many of these later paintings and old prints that are inaccurate, as the discursive captions often rightly note, and sometimes too small to make out anyway). In all, this will provide students a coherent view of events if not a clear understanding of Shawnee culture or Tecumseh’s heroic personal qualities. If it's not the 100-page holy grail of middle-grade biographies, it is still pretty close. (glossary, bibliography, source notes, index) (Biography. 11-13)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4027-6847-7
Page Count: 124
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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