by Donna Jo Napoli & illustrated by Christina Balit ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 11, 2011
Superb versions for reading alone or for sharing with audiences large or small.
Oft-told tales retold with uncommon verve and outfitted with resplendent Art Deco–style portraits.
Napoli opens with the rise of the “mother force” Gaia to bring order to the whirling elements of Chaos and closes with the devastation of the Trojan War (“the doing of gods with too much time on their hands”). In between, she introduces over two dozen immortals and heroes—including Hestia, Helios and Selene among the better-known Olympians and their mortal offspring. While somehow managing to keep all the sex inexplicit (Aphrodite is born, for instance, from the “foam” produced by an unspecified body part ripped from her father Uranus), she lays out clear family lines. She pays close attention to her narrative’s tone and sound, capturing the nature of each god or mortal with vivid turns of phrase: Peaceable Hestia considers Zeus a “frightful maniac,” Orion grows up to become “an insufferably pompous nitwit” and Selene is left to pine, “silver sweet, and soft, and sad,” for her eternally sleeping lover, Endymion. Applying rippling strokes of intense color, Balit opens with a shimmering family tree of Olympians, heads each chapter with a stylized full-body image of a mythological figure with associated emblems and symbols and also contributes interior illustrations and thumbnail portraits for the closing summary cast list.
Superb versions for reading alone or for sharing with audiences large or small. (Mythology. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 11, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4263-0844-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: National Geographic
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
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developed by Basher ; illustrated by Basher ; by Dan Green ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 8, 2013
Like Hanoch Piven’s What Presidents Are Made Of (2004), more a quick novelty than a reliable source of information or...
Each of the “Oval Office All-Stars” steps up for a brief say in Basher’s newest cartoon gallery—a rare break from his usual STEM topics (Technology: A Byte-Sized World!, 2012, etc.).
Sounding downright cheeky (“I was one wise sucker, I can assure you,” smirks Thomas Jefferson), each president from Washington to Obama delivers a two-paragraph thumbnail summary of his administration’s highlights and, often, lowlights, sandwiched between trios of bulleted “firsts” or trivia. Despite differences in hairstyles, the egg-headed caricatures on each facing page look pretty much alike (Obama excepted), but Basher does add distinguishing dress or other small items, from broken shackles at Lincoln’s feet to Calvin Coolidge’s pet raccoon. A complete set of postage-stamp–sized official portraits brings up the rear. Green is sometimes loose with his facts—the president is not the “head of the federal government,” nor was the system of checks and balances created because presidents “sometimes do stupid things, have crazy ideas, and generally fumble their way through”—and uses an opaque metaphor in characterizing Nixon as “a shifty operator who liked to sail close to the wind” (did he mean “played his cards close to his chest” maybe?). These quibbles aside, the real issue here is that, aside from some of the trivia, all the information is so easily available elsewhere.
Like Hanoch Piven’s What Presidents Are Made Of (2004), more a quick novelty than a reliable source of information or enlightenment. (foldout poster) (Collective biography. 10-13)Pub Date: Jan. 8, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-7534-6964-4
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Kingfisher
Review Posted Online: Feb. 14, 2013
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by Vicky Alvear Shecter ; illustrated by Antoine Revoy ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2013
Staid, dispensable illustrations aside, an informative and unusually lively look at the Egyptian way of death.
The jackal-headed god dares readers to come along on the sun god Ra’s nightly journey through Duat, the Egyptian afterworld, to rebirth.
Schecter (Cleopatra Rules!, 2010) properly notes at the outset that Egyptian beliefs were not monolithic, so her canine co-conspirator has chosen elements that convey the “gist.” The god himself steps up to promise with indecent relish that there will be “blood. And snakes. And decapitations. And monsters who like to gobble up hearts and squeeze heads until they pop.” Anubis begins by describing how Ra created the world and the major gods by (as he puts it) “hocking a giant lougie” but ultimately left Earth in disgust to take up residence in the heavens. He delivers an hour-by-hour travelogue of Ra’s passage through the “dark lands” and accounts of gory battles that repeatedly leave the evil giant snake Apophis chopped into sushi. Anubis goes on to deliver introductions to ancient Egyptian culture and myths, major pharaohs, mummification (with particular emphasis on the gross bits) and burial practices—since, as he perceptively points out, Ra’s voyage also served as symbol and metaphor for the human passage through life and the afterlife.
Staid, dispensable illustrations aside, an informative and unusually lively look at the Egyptian way of death. (cast list, glossary, bibliography, index) (Mythology. 10-13)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-59078-995-7
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Boyds Mills
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2013
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by Vicky Alvear Shecter ; illustrated by J.E. Larson
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