A frank, often funny appreciation of our space program’s high-water mark.
Brown launches the Big Ideas That Changed the World series with a graphic commemoration of the program that put boots on the moon.
Brown assumes the narrative voice of Rodman Law, a wisecracking professional daredevil who attempted to ride a rocket in 1913 (“Yeah, this oughta work”) and beat the odds by surviving the explosion. He opens with a capsule history of rocketry from ancient China to the Mercury and Gemini programs before recapping the Apollo missions. Keeping the tone light and offering nods as he goes to historical figures including Johann Schmidlap (“rhymes with ‘Fmidlap’ ”), “cranky loner” Robert Goddard, and mathematician Katherine Johnson, he focuses on technological advances that made space travel possible and on the awesome, sustained effort that brought President John F. Kennedy’s “Big Idea” to fruition, ending the narrative with our last visit to the moon. Aside from the numerous huge, raw explosions that punctuate his easy-to-follow sequential panels, the author uses restrained colors and loose, fluid modeling to give his mildly cartoonish depictions of figures and (then) cutting-edge technology an engagingly informal air. He doesn’t gloss over Laika’s sad fate or the ugly fact that Wernher von Braun built rockets for the Nazis with “concentration-camp prisoners.” Occasional interjections and a closing author’s note also signal Brown’s awareness that for this story, at least, his cast had to be almost exclusively white and male.
A frank, often funny appreciation of our space program’s high-water mark. (index, endnotes, resource lists) (Graphic nonfiction. 8-11)Pub Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3404-5
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 20, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2018
Another terrific case study on the power of a big idea to work profound changes in our lives.
How rows of rocks evolved into the intricate circuitry that runs our homes, drives our cars, and orders our pizza.
Brown lets al-Khwārizmī, the Muslim mathematician who popularized Arabic/Hindu numbers (most notably, for Brown’s purposes here, “0” and “1”), take the role of tour guide. He squires readers through centuries of watershed developments from the abacus and mechanical Pascaline calculator to the punch cards of Joseph-Marie Jacquard, ENIAC, IBM, the transistor, and robots. Closing with an explanation of the Turing test, he offers a mildly cautionary view of the increasingly pervasive roles computers play in our daily lives (“will they be doing all the thinking for us?”) and an appended disquisition on binary numbers. Along the way he chronicles both major and incremental advances as well as offering nods to significant thinkers and doers familiar (Ada Lovelace, Steve Jobs) or otherwise—notably Jean Jennings and six other women charged with figuring out how to program ENIAC but not invited to its unveiling. Though he acknowledges in an afterword that his cast is largely White, European, and male he does what he can throughout to diversify it…and cogently observes at the end that the “domination of the West in the sciences has ended.” Panels are drawn in a loose style that lightens the substantial informational load.
Another terrific case study on the power of a big idea to work profound changes in our lives. (endnotes, timeline) (Graphic nonfiction. 8-11)Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4098-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 7, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
Somewhat silly but slightly muddled; look elsewhere for meaningful guidance on coping with social anxiety.
A cartoon dive into all things embarrassing.
Intending to show that “the better you understand [embarrassment], the better you control it,” Harper explores several common categories of embarrassment (“social oops,” “it’s on you and it shouldn’t be,” “parents in public,” etc.) before including the insights of real-life licensed health counselor Grace Y. Lin (depicted as a pink hippo). A string of characters accompany readers through the book: Badgey, who has “badges for bravery and words of wisdom”; an unnamed anthropomorphic dog who never gets embarrassed; and a host of child characters who act as examples for different scenarios (and who have a range of pink, tan, and brown skin). Busy pages, a two-dimensional character style, and all-caps lettering give the illustrations a doodled feel. Harper’s ultimate conclusion that “embarrassment + time = good story” reminds readers that time—and a sense of humor—can soften embarrassment. However, the book’s center may be lost as readers become bogged down in detailed examples that focus more often on embarrassing scenarios than on offering tools for reframing thinking, making this very much not a book for anyone with social anxiety.
Somewhat silly but slightly muddled; look elsewhere for meaningful guidance on coping with social anxiety. (Graphic nonfiction. 8-11)Pub Date: Nov. 10, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5235-1017-7
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Workman
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2020
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