An amusing, informative look at apocalyptic pop culture.
An entertaining and fascinating compendium of doomsday scenarios depicted in fiction, film, graphic novels, plays, songs, television series and works of art.
In her introduction, Barcella notes it was "overwhelming…having to narrow the list down to just fifty," but offers no insight into how she arrived at her final list. Her sole criterion for selection seems only to be that they are "iconic." The apocalyptic scenarios include alien conquest, bioterrorism, natural catastrophe, nuclear war, superviruses and zombie plagues. R.E.M.'s song "It's the End of the World" and the film When Worlds Collide are obvious selections, but there are many interesting surprises. Who knew authors as different as E.M. Forster, Jack London and Mary Shelley all wrote apocalyptic short stories and novels? Most people listening to Nena's "99 Luftballons" today probably don't realize it's about the Cold War–era shadow of nuclear annihilation. The examples are unimaginatively listed in alphabetical order by title rather than by type of apocalypse or medium. Each entry includes a concise synopsis of the work, brief discussion of its impact and influence, photograph or visual outtake, and quotes from or relating to it. A sidebar called "Reality Factor" discusses the plausibility of the scenario. Doomsday buffs will especially enjoy second-guessing Barcella's choices and dissecting her synopses.
An amusing, informative look at apocalyptic pop culture. (Nonfiction. 12-18)Pub Date: July 4, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-9827322-5-0
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Zest Books
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2012
Enlightening, inspiring, and moving.
Pennies, glass bottles, a parking meter, and a kick line: how a police raid became a community’s symbol of freedom.
June 28, 1969: the night the gay bar Stonewall was raided by the police for the second time in a week to stop a blackmail operation. What began as a supposedly routine police raid ended with over 2,000 angry, fed-up protesters fighting against the police in New York’s West Village. Bausum eloquently and thoughtfully recounts it all, from the violent arrest of a young lesbian by the police to an angry, mocking, Broadway-style kick line of young men protesting against New York’s Tactical Control Force. Bausum not only recounts the action of the evening in clear, blow-by-blow journalistic prose, she also is careful to point out assumptions and misunderstandings that might also have occurred during the hot summer night. Her narrative feels fueled by rage and empowerment and the urge to tell the truth. She doesn’t bat an eye when recounting the ways that the LGBT fought to find freedom, love, and the physical manifestations of those feelings, whether at the Stonewall Inn or inside the back of a meat truck parked along the Hudson River. Readers coming of age at a time when state after state is beginning to celebrate gay marriage will be astonished to return to a time when it was a crime for a man to wear a dress.
Enlightening, inspiring, and moving. (Nonfiction. 13-16)Pub Date: May 5, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-670-01679-2
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2015
Weintraub’s research on the prisoners’ experiences in the camps is remarkable as he narrates Judy and Frank’s heroic tale.
An unusual and moving story of a singular hero among fellow POWs of the Japanese during World War II: a loyal British pointer named Judy.
With bite and substance, Slate columnist Weintraub (The Victory Season: The End of World War II and the Birth of Baseball's Golden Age, 2013, etc.) chronicles Judy’s incredible life. Two British soldiers initially adopted her as a mascot for the HMS Gnat, which patrolled the Yangtze River, and she went on to a highly dangerous and decorated career with her captured crew. As a puppy at the Shanghai Dog Kennels, Judy (adapted from her Chinese given name, Shudi, meaning “peaceful”) got kicked around by the invading Japanese sailors, so she learned early on aboard the Gnat who her friends were. The men adored her, and although she was not properly trained as a “gun dog,” pointing at game, she became invaluable for her early warnings of danger. In telling Judy’s adventures, as she was moved from Singapore to a stint in several miserable Japanese POW camps in the Dutch East Indies, Weintraub delineates the plight of the British sailors who took care of her and kept her safe. With the fall of Singapore in early 1942, a massive evacuation was undertaken in Keppel Harbor, from which many refugee boats took off but few survived the strafing by Japanese planes. Miraculously, Judy survived, but she was captured by the Japanese. In captivity, she met the man who would become her lifetime master, Londoner Frank Williams, formerly of the Merchant Navy, who was too tall to fly but worked in mechanics and radar. By mutual trust and aid, dog and man survived several brutal Japanese camps together, braving hunger, sadistic guards, snakes, and tigers.
Weintraub’s research on the prisoners’ experiences in the camps is remarkable as he narrates Judy and Frank’s heroic tale.Pub Date: May 5, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-316-33706-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 10, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2015
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