A smartly designed, profusely illustrated history of shoes, their lore and styles. The Yues (Armor, 1994, etc.) open with a series of provocative questions to make readers focus on how they choose shoes and what statements their footwear makes about them, linking those answers to a larger picture: ``Since early times people have wanted beauty in their lives and have needed to express their individuality and, for these reasons, have created shoes of different styles and materials.'' Beginning with an illustration of the foot, the authors trace the chronology of shoes from the Oregon sandal of 10,000 years ago to the styles of the present. Detailed descriptions with accurate, elegant black- and-white drawings show how shoes are made and how fashions have changed through the centuries: sandals, brogues, oxfords, saddle shoes, cowboy boots, and even rollerblades. The traditions can be fascinating, e.g., a Greek woman could burn the shoe of a lost lover to get him back. The charms of shoes will not be lost on readers: ``Shoes are our contact point with the earth. . . . They can be artistic; they can be witty.'' With endpapers showing a progression of styles and heel heights, from the sturdiest of oxfords to the strappiest of sandals, this is an enchanting book, surpassing even Laurie Lawlor's Where Will This Shoe Take You? (1996). (bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 8-12)
Pub Date: April 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-395-72667-0
Page Count: 92
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1997
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
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care.
In 1977, the oil carrier Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of oil into a formerly pristine Alaskan ocean inlet, killing millions of birds, animals, and fish. Despite a cleanup, crude oil is still there.
The Winters foretold the destructive powers of the atomic bomb allusively in The Secret Project (2017), leaving the actuality to the backmatter. They make no such accommodations to young audiences in this disturbing book. From the dark front cover, on which oily blobs conceal a seabird, to the rescuer’s sad face on the back, the mother-son team emphasizes the disaster. A relatively easy-to-read and poetically heightened text introduces the situation. Oil is pumped from the Earth “all day long, all night long, / day after day, year after year” in “what had been unspoiled land, home to Native people // and thousands of caribou.” The scale of extraction is huge: There’s “a giant pipeline” leading to “enormous ships.” Then, crash. Rivers of oil gush out over three full-bleed wordless pages. Subsequent scenes show rocks, seabirds, and sea otters covered with oil. Finally, 30 years later, animals have returned to a cheerful scene. “But if you lift a rock… // oil / seeps / up.” For an adult reader, this is heartbreaking. How much more difficult might this be for an animal-loving child?
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care. (author’s note, further reading) (Informational picture book. 9-12)Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3077-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
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