A bland alternative to You Wouldn’t Want to Be an Aztec Sacrifice (2013) and other entries in that rousing series.
In a tongue-limbering recitation, Tlenamacac (fire priest) Ten Vulture describes his city, his gods, and his training.
“It’s the year 1518 and you’re in the middle of the Aztec Empire,” he burbles, with a fine disregard for verisimilitude. “Aztecs rule, ok?” Ten Vulture then introduces Itztlacoliuhqui, Xipe Totec (“god of flayed skins…”), and eight other deities whose names are left to readers to sound out. Following this, he retraces his history from being chosen for the priesthood through games, wars, and blood sacrifices (with a bit of cannibalism thrown in). Despite multiple references to gruesome ritual practices, though, in the cartoon illustrations the occasional spatters of gore are almost unnoticeable. Aloisi populates his scenes with brown-skinned, bare-chested boys and men sporting elaborate headdresses or topknots (the few women in view are discreetly covered up). The attempt at historical accuracy seems to die with the scribbles that stand in for Aztec writing. At least most of the kanji in the co-published How to Live Like a Samurai Warrior and the hieroglyphics in How to Live Like an Egyptian Mummy Maker seem to be more than generic scribbles. These and How to Live Like a Caribbean Pirate (who were nearly all, at least according to illustrator Tatio Viano, white) are similarly framed as narratives by young participants.
A bland alternative to You Wouldn’t Want to Be an Aztec Sacrifice (2013) and other entries in that rousing series. (index, glossary) (Nonfiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5124-0628-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Hungry Tomato/Lerner
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Sentimental of plotline but informative and breathlessly paced.
The seventh (chronologically earliest) entry in the series pitches a young former slave into the middle of the Civil War’s pivotal battle.
Having saved a Union soldier named Henry Green by hurling a live skunk at his Confederate captors, young Thomas finds himself and his little sister Birdie adopted by Green’s unit. Three weeks, an ambush and a quick march later, Thomas unexpectedly finds himself in the thick of the fighting—possibly on Missionary Ridge itself, though the author doesn’t provide a specific location. Rather than go into details of the battle, Tarshis offers broad overviews of slavery and the war’s course (adding more about the latter in an afterword that includes the text of the Gettysburg Address). She folds these into quick pictures of military camp life and the violence-laced fog of war. Afterward, Thomas and Birdie are reunited with their older cousin Clem, who had been sold away, and make good on a promise to Green (who doesn’t survive) to settle with his Vermont parents and attend the school taught by his sweetheart.
Sentimental of plotline but informative and breathlessly paced. (Q&A, annotated reading list) (Historical fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-45936-5
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 25, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Even readers mad for all things horse won’t give this more than a quick graze before galloping off to richer pastures.
Bright colors and ornate furbelows flash in this survey of horsey fashion through the ages.
The vague topic and Patent’s accompanying commentary—being noticeably thin on specifics—come off as pretexts for an album of portraits for coltish horse lovers. Unfortunately, Brett doesn’t pick up the slack, as both horses and human figures posing in her flat paintings are drawn with unfinished, generic features, and the various blankets, braids, straps, plumes, fringes, saddles and pieces of armor on view are neither consistently identified nor displayed to best advantage. Grouped by function, the gallery of 14 examples opens with war horses (including armored steeds from an unspecified period of the Middle Ages and an Egyptian chariot confusingly paired to an Assyrian scenario set several centuries too early). It then goes on to portray horses trained to dance, race or compete in never-explained ways as draft teams. Following a final batch duded up for parades or, in ancient Scythia, ritual burial, a pair of labeled portraits, one of equine body parts and the other of standard tack, is shoehorned in.
Even readers mad for all things horse won’t give this more than a quick graze before galloping off to richer pastures. (index, bibliography, websites) (Nonfiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Feb. 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-58089-362-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
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