A lavishly illustrated picture book joins archival material, diagrams, and original paintings to tell the story of how the Wright brothers invented the airplane. The text briefly covers their lives before Kitty Hawk, focusing narrowly on the period from 1899 to 1903 as they experimented and refined their designs in pursuit of a self-propelled flying machine. The sprightly, lucid text takes the brothers back and forth from their Dayton, Ohio, bicycle shop to Kitty Hawk, quoting from their letters and from the recollections of witnesses to give a terrific sense of immediacy. Sidebars and diagrams explain the various innovations the brothers tried: from the wing and rudder controls on the actual Flyers to the wind tunnel they built in their workshop to test aerodynamics. One further chapter and an epilogue detail the brothers’ activities subsequent to that history-making flight: their efforts to patent and market their invention and the founding of the Wright Company, which designed aircraft for both military and civilian uses. Busby’s text, his first for children, deftly combines technical detail with narrative thrust; Jack McMaster’s diagrams complement the technical descriptions beautifully, while Craig’s (Attack on Pearl Harbor, not reviewed) lush oils add dramatic flair. One significant flaw is that many of the primary sources are quoted blind, with no indication in the text or back matter where the observations came from (a stellar exception to this is the citation of Orville’s letters home from Kitty Hawk). Two pages of back matter provide a chronology, select glossary, bibliography (which includes books for younger and older readers as well as Web sites), picture credits, and index. (Picture book/nonfiction. 8-12)
Pub Date: March 11, 2003
ISBN: 0-375-81287-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2002
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Affecting and hopeful.
A stray dog finds her destiny amid the chaos of a Southern California wildfire.
Wombat is a small dog with stubby legs and “silly ears / that look like furry cookies”—almost impossibly cute in Bricking’s occasional pencil-style vignettes. She’s mastered the art of survival, so when a mysterious internal voice prods her to go toward the fire, she resists. “The wrong way is the right way. / The right way is the wrong way,” the voice insists. When she tells fellow stray Silas about it, he tells Wombat she’s a “destiny dog,” bound to “find their person / before their person / can find them.” Convinced, she decides to follow the mysterious instructions. Meanwhile, Henry, a boy who’s leery of dogs, loves the bats at the wildlife rehabilitation center where Mama Ro, a veterinarian, works; his Mama J is a librarian. Henry and Barnabas, a fruit bat at the center, are both uprooted by the fire, and their paths converge with Wombat’s at an emergency shelter. The third-person perspective shifts from character to character in clusters of free-verse poems that fully immerse readers in each one’s experiences in turn. This extra-concentrated delivery of Applegate’s typically spare writing proves effective, balancing terror and sadness with heart and humor. Henry has light brown skin, Mama Ro has curly black hair and brown skin, and Mama J presents white.
Affecting and hopeful. (Verse fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9780063221178
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Storytide/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
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