by David Yeadon & illustrated by David Yeadon ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 10, 2009
A treasure chest of images that coalesce into a distinct, original sense of place and time.
Serendipitous Gaelic wanderlustings from the ever-peregrinating Yeadon (Seasons on Harris: A Year in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides, 2006, etc.).
The author has hit upon a winning formula: Disappear somewhere, preferably a wild, back-of-beyond place, then spend a year charting its seasons and exercising a strong streak of inquisitiveness. The Beara Peninsula is tailor-made for such an endeavor. Poking into the Atlantic off Ireland’s Southwest coast, it is stubbornly, gloriously remote, a long way from the tourist buses clogging the Ring of Kerry, but riotously alive with history, powerful landscapes and curious characters. Yeadon is one of those travelers you have to admire. He’s not afraid to make a fool of himself to gain insight, nor to look around at horse-and-buggy speed. Nothing epitomizes his refusal to hurry more than his evocations of the art of the pour, described in yearning detail as he awaits a pint of the black in the many pubs he enters with wife Anne, who adds smart observations along the way. While the Celtic Tiger makes its dent in the global economy, the Beara steps to a relaxed beat. On its narrow, windy roads, the author notes, “we’d been told many drivers were unlicensed, uninsured, and far too often, unsober.” The residents—a critical mass of musicians, cheesemakers, cooks, artists, poets, fishermen, shepherds, healers and crazy sportsmen—indulge in the sport of hurling, “an ancient bogman’s game of pure unrestrained, skull-crushing passion.” Yeadon meets them all and captures them in robust illustrations as well as words. When he needs to provide historical background, he makes it into a story, coaxing readers to engage in Ireland’s furious past filled with class warfare, famines, enclosures and colonial perfidies. He’s at his best when taking in the lay of the land: glacier-gouged mountain passes, stone circles, black-water lakes, moors and peat bogs, hills “as rugged as a rhino’s carapace” and the strange, unrepentant weather that marks life on the western shore.
A treasure chest of images that coalesce into a distinct, original sense of place and time.Pub Date: Feb. 10, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-06-115127-9
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Perennial/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2009
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis
by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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developed by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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