An enormous home run.
The action-packed saga of the New York Yankees is recounted for young readers by an author who knows the team well.
Founded in 1903 as the New York Americans, they were also known as the Highlanders, but newspapers soon started calling them the Yankees. They were an average team, and nothing in those early years hinted at the successes to come. Then, in 1920, along came Babe Ruth in a trade that Boston fans later bemoaned as the “curse of the Bambino,” and everything changed. What followed was nearly a century of dominance that would lead to 40 American League pennants and 27 World Series championships. Their story is told in mostly chronological order, focusing on the personalities and actions of owners, managers and players who were key figures, from “Wee Willie” Keeler all the way to Derek Jeter. Keeping the young audience in mind and employing a conversational tone throughout, Appel incorporates each era’s customs, slang and wider events into the narrative seamlessly via brief parenthetical explanations and comparisons. There are familiar stories and some fascinating behind-the scenes information. Championships and superstars are here, of course, but so are the long gaps without a pennant and players involved with steroids. This is a work that will be shared by young readers and their baseball-loving parents and grandparents.
An enormous home run. (foreword, statistics, reading list, index) (Nonfiction. 9-16)Pub Date: Feb. 17, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4814-1602-3
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care.
In 1977, the oil carrier Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of oil into a formerly pristine Alaskan ocean inlet, killing millions of birds, animals, and fish. Despite a cleanup, crude oil is still there.
The Winters foretold the destructive powers of the atomic bomb allusively in The Secret Project (2017), leaving the actuality to the backmatter. They make no such accommodations to young audiences in this disturbing book. From the dark front cover, on which oily blobs conceal a seabird, to the rescuer’s sad face on the back, the mother-son team emphasizes the disaster. A relatively easy-to-read and poetically heightened text introduces the situation. Oil is pumped from the Earth “all day long, all night long, / day after day, year after year” in “what had been unspoiled land, home to Native people // and thousands of caribou.” The scale of extraction is huge: There’s “a giant pipeline” leading to “enormous ships.” Then, crash. Rivers of oil gush out over three full-bleed wordless pages. Subsequent scenes show rocks, seabirds, and sea otters covered with oil. Finally, 30 years later, animals have returned to a cheerful scene. “But if you lift a rock… // oil / seeps / up.” For an adult reader, this is heartbreaking. How much more difficult might this be for an animal-loving child?
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care. (author’s note, further reading) (Informational picture book. 9-12)Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3077-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
A refreshed version of a classic that doesn’t hold up to more recent works.
A new edition of late author Zinn’s 2007 work, which was adapted for young readers by Stefoff and based on Zinn’s groundbreaking 1980 original for adults.
This updated version, also adapted by Stefoff, a writer for children and teens, contains new material by journalist Morales. The work opens with the arrival of Christopher Columbus and concludes with a chapter by Morales on social and political issues from 2006 through the election of President Joe Biden seen through the lens of Latinx identity. Zinn’s work famously takes a radically different perspective from that of most mainstream history books, viewing conflicts as driven by rich people taking advantage of poorer ones. Zinn professed his own point of view as being “critical of war, racism, and economic injustice,” an approach that felt fresh among popular works of the time. Unfortunately, despite upgrades that include Morales’ perspective, “a couple of insights into Native American history,” and “a look at the Asian American activism that flourished alongside other social movements in the 1960s and 1970s,” the book feels dated. It entirely lacks footnotes, endnotes, or references, so readers cannot verify facts or further investigate material, and the black-and-white images lack credits. Although the work seeks to be inclusive, readers may wonder about the omission of many subjects relating to race, gender, and sexuality, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act, Indian boarding schools, the Tulsa Race Massacre, Loving v. Virginia, the Stonewall Uprising, Roe v. Wade, Title IX, the AIDS crisis, and the struggle for marriage equality.
A refreshed version of a classic that doesn’t hold up to more recent works. (glossary, index) (Nonfiction. 10-16)Pub Date: Jan. 3, 2023
ISBN: 9781644212516
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Triangle Square Books for Young Readers
Review Posted Online: Jan. 9, 2024
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