Wholly absorbing—a sure-fire way to turn even a casual birder into a woodpecker fanatic.
Bannick details 41 different species of woodpeckers across 11 genera in this nonfiction work.
The author became enthralled with woodpeckers at the tender age of 8 or 9 after spying one through his kitchen window; it’s a good bet that readers will grow equally enamored with the intriguing little creatures as well. That’s due to both Bannick’s encyclopedic knowledge of the birds and the often-lyrical prose he uses to describe them. “As the first golden rays of light splintered through bundles of needles on giant red-armored ponderosa pines in Washington’s Cascade Range, I began to hear a cacophonous mixture of shrieks, mewing, churrs, rattles, warbles, cackles, and chipping blended with loud, rhythmic drumming of various cadences and amplitudes,” he writes. The effect of such language is infectious and enough to send one off on a scouting expedition to see what might be uncovered in one’s own backyard. Woodpeckers can be found performing their indispensable handiwork from the Caribbean all the way to the Arctic; the author sets his sights on those living in North America over the course of a year. He calls them “tree doctor[s],” explaining that the birds are beneficial to humans as they control pests and shield trees from destructive budworms and the like. Woodpeckers also create and improve habitats by making sap available to migrating animals, dispersing seeds, and cultivating the soil with the wood chips they produce by hammering their impressive bills into hard tree bark. How do they do this and avoid causing severe harm to themselves? Bannick has the detailed answer to that question, as well as a treasure-trove of many others. The text is fascinating and a delight to read, supplemented by a generous amount of stunning close-up full-color photography by the author. Sadly, some of these marvelous birds are in trouble due to a variety of factors ranging from excessive timber harvesting to climate change—the author hopes that a greater appreciation for woodpeckers and an increased awareness about the perils they face will spur humans to come to their aid.
Wholly absorbing—a sure-fire way to turn even a casual birder into a woodpecker fanatic.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2025
ISBN: 9781680513165
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Mountaineers Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
SEEN & HEARD
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