Casual, occasionally to a fault, but broad of scope and chock full of juicy role models and anti-models.
Profiles of ancient and early modern rulers historically adjudged “Great” or…not so much.
O’Sullivan chooses her 25 entries from a pre-20th-century but worldwide roster—including figures from Indian, Persian, and Mayan realms and from Hawaii, Madagascar, Korea, and Morocco as well as diverse European countries. Separating “Greats” from “Terribles” and mixing in eight women, she leads off with Pharaoh Hatshepsut and concludes with “Bloody Mary” Tudor and Sultan Ismail “the Bloodthirsty.” Along with tucking in side notes for each subject on broader legacies and on contemporary events elsewhere in the world, she appends lists offering two dozen more “Worthies” and “Notably Notorious” to check out. Her profiles, though brief, are invitingly informal (for Hatshepsut, “pyramids were already so last millennium”) and focus as much on positive or negative character traits as on deeds and misdeeds. She commends the tolerance of Cyrus the Great for other religions and cultures in his empire, for instance, and Süleyman the Magnificent for not “micromanaging” his appointees. She also repeatedly points out that even the best sometimes went wrong, and vice versa. On the other hand, writing that the suspension of church services by “Bad” King John was unpopular because it took away a “ ‘fun’ thing to do” is pretty superficial. Lugo supplies formally posed upper-body portraits of the smiling or scowling subjects.
Casual, occasionally to a fault, but broad of scope and chock full of juicy role models and anti-models. (index) (Collective biography. 10-13)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-7624-9661-7
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Running Press Kids
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An introduction to ancient Egypt and the Pharaohs buried in the Valley of the Kings. The authors begin with how archaeologist Howard Carter found the tomb of King Tut, then move back 3,000 years to the time of Thutmosis I, who built the first tomb in the Valley of the Kings. Finally they describe the building of the tomb of a later Pharaoh, Ramses II. The backward-forward narration is not always easy to follow, and the authors attribute emotions to the Pharaohs without citation. For example, “Thutmosis III was furious [with Hatshepsut]. He was especially annoyed that she planned to be buried in KV 20, the tomb of her father.” Since both these people lived 3,500 years ago, speculation on who was furious or annoyed should be used with extreme caution. And the tangled intrigue of Egyptian royalty is not easily sorted out in so brief a work. Throughout, though, there are spectacular photographs of ancient Egyptian artifacts, monuments, tomb paintings, jewels, and death masks that will appeal to young viewers. The photographs of the exposed mummies of Ramses II, King Tut, and Seti I are compelling. More useful for the hauntingly beautiful photos than the text. (brief bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-7922-7223-4
Page Count: 64
Publisher: National Geographic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
It’s a quick skim with higgledy-piggledy page design, but it’s carefully tuned to spark thought and discussion rather than...
A Holocaust mosaic with a particular focus on children, constructed from period photos and short extracts from diaries or survivors’ accounts.
Woolf pithily links the documentary material in a narrative and fills in historical background—properly noting at the outset that Jews weren’t the Nazis’ only targets and closing with the cogent observation that anti-Semitic violence didn’t stop with the war’s end. In between, a crazy quilt of passages in italics records the experiences of young people before and after Kristallnacht, in the Kindertransport and other flights, as hidden children (including one boy disguised as a girl), in the forced relocations to ghettos and to concentration and extermination camps. Biographical information about the authors of these testimonials ranges from little to none. Still, many have faces thanks to the many family snapshots that mingle with more journalistic photos of people being herded by soldiers, of camp facilities and of poignant artifacts. Following a provocative authorial comment that most “ordinary people” turned a blind eye to what was happening “because it was easier, in the end, to ignore something that didn’t affect them personally,” a quick look at postwar recovery efforts and commemorations is capped with a reference to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
It’s a quick skim with higgledy-piggledy page design, but it’s carefully tuned to spark thought and discussion rather than to shock alone. (timeline, websites, fiction and nonfiction bibliographies, index) (Nonfiction. 11-13)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-7641-6758-4
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Barron's
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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