A serviceable account of a tough job for tough-minded people—rewarding but with a heavy load of responsibility.
An agent who stood (as his 2014 memoir puts it) Within Arm’s Length of three presidents offers a pared-down version of his training and career.
Emmett reduces mention of family and domestic life to passing mentions, covers a post-retirement stint in the CIA in a few sketchy pages, and leaves out entirely the ax-grinding complaints about officious superiors and “politically correct” policies and practices that set the tone in his original account. What’s left is a stiff but not entirely humorless recounting of how he achieved his ambition to become a Secret Service agent—sparked in grade school by JFK’s assassination—after a tour of duty in the Marines. He then made his way up from investigating check fraud and counterfeiting (the Secret Service’s original raison d’être) to join the Presidential Protective Division to work both “shift” assignments and on more heavily armed Counter Assault Teams during the Bush and Clinton administrations. “Sometimes people think Secret Service agents are cold-blooded, steely-eyed bodyguards with large biceps and dark glasses,” he writes. But “real Secret Service agents do not wear sunglasses indoors.” As to the rest, readers can judge for themselves from his experiences and expressed attitudes. He closes with career-prep advice and a timeline that includes presidential assassinations, both attempted and successful, through 2009.
A serviceable account of a tough job for tough-minded people—rewarding but with a heavy load of responsibility. (Memoir. 12-15)Pub Date: June 6, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-250-13030-3
Page Count: 256
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
Insofar as the reading level of the book for adults is on a par with this effort—for the most part, only the substance has...
This distillation of the best-selling Killing Jesus: A History (2013) retains the original’s melodramatic tone and present-tense narration. Also its political agenda.
The conservative pundit’s account of Jesus’ life and, in brutal detail, death begins with a nonsensically altered title, an arguable claim to presenting a “fact-based book” and, tellingly, a list of “Key Players” (inserted presumably to help young readers keep track of all the names). Like its source, its prose is as purple as can be, often word for word: “There is a power to Jesus’s gait and a steely determination to his gaze.” Harping on “taxes extorted from the people of Judea” as the chief cause of continuing local unrest, the author presents Jewish society as governed with equal force by religious ritual and by the Romans, and he thoroughly demonizes Herod Antipas (“he even looks the part of a true villain”). Alterations for young readers include more illustrations, periodic sidebars, far fewer maps and a streamlining of context so that the focus is squarely on Jesus, with less attention on the historical moment—an unfortunate choice. Assorted notes on 16 various side topics, from a look at Roman roads to the rise of the cross as a Christian symbol, follow. A mix of 19th-century images, photos of ancient sites and artifacts supplement frequent new illustrations (not seen) from Low.
Insofar as the reading level of the book for adults is on a par with this effort—for the most part, only the substance has been simplified—it’s hard to see the value of this iteration. (source list, recommended reading) (Biography. 12-15)Pub Date: April 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-8050-9877-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Feb. 25, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2014
Cogent of topic, but for readability, it’s aptly titled.
In urgent tones, a call for action as climate change and continuing waste and pollution of available fresh water pose imminent threats to human health and agriculture.
Drawing from recently published reports and news stories, Kallen paints an alarming picture. Aquifers are being sucked dry by large-scale agriculture, lake levels are falling, and water sources above- and belowground are being polluted. Though he points to a few significant counterefforts—the Clean Water Act (1972) in the United States and local initiatives elsewhere, such as “rainwater harvesting” ponds in India and Kenya—these come off as spotty responses that are often hobbled by political and corporate foot-dragging. He also points to shrinking glaciers and snow packs (plus, for added gloom, superstorms like Sandy) as harbingers of climate change that will lead to widespread future disaster. Aside from occasional incidents or examples and rare if telling photos, though, this jeremiad is largely composed of generalities and big numbers—not a formula for motivating young readers. Nor does the author offer budding eco-activists much in the way of either hope or ways to become part of the solution; for the latter, at least, Cathryn Berger Kaye’s Going Blue: A Teen’s Guide to Saving Our Oceans, Lakes, Rivers, & Wetlands (2010) is a better choice.
Cogent of topic, but for readability, it’s aptly titled. (source notes, multimedia resource lists, index) (Nonfiction. 12-14)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4677-2646-7
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Twenty-First Century/Lerner
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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