An uninspired, unnecessary, superficial treatment of a critically important subject.
Arresting visuals are the distinguishing feature of this introduction to the Holocaust for middle graders.
Divided into three sections, Steele’s capsulized chronicle begins by putting the Holocaust in historical context with information about centuries-old anti-Semitic sentiment in Europe, its co-option by Hitler and the Nazis in post–World War I Germany, and the systematic persecution of Jews with their rise. The second section covers deportations, concentration camps, the Final Solution, and acts of resistance by both Jews and Righteous Gentiles. Steele notes that Jews were not the only victims. The third section covers the liberation of the camps, displaced persons, the Nuremberg trials, and the founding of Israel. The abundant use of photographs is often visually striking, but the flat, dull, textbooklike writing is presented in clumps of text void of nuance, finesse, or narrative cohesion, resulting in a sadly simplistic treatment of a hugely complex subject. Minimal use is made of quotations from perpetrators, survivors, and liberators. There are no source notes, bibliography, suggestions for further reading, or even a list of websites listed in the end matter. Numerous books are already available on the Holocaust, offering a far more compelling and insightful overview of the subject.
An uninspired, unnecessary, superficial treatment of a critically important subject. (photos, maps, glossary, photo credits, index) (Nonfiction. 11-13)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-338-03040-2
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
After surveying “competing claims” for the first Thanksgiving from 1541 on, in Texas, Florida, Maine, Virginia and Massachusetts, Colman decides in favor of the 1621 event with the English colonists and Wampanoag as the first “because the 1621 event was more like the Thanksgiving that we celebrate today.” She demonstrates, however, that the “Pilgrim and Indian” story is really not the antecedent of Thanksgiving as we celebrate it today. Rather, two very old traditions—harvest festivals and days of thanksgiving for special events—were the origin, and this interesting volume traces how the custom of proclaiming a general day of thanksgiving took hold. Yet, since many Thanksgiving celebrations in towns and schools are still rooted in the “Pilgrim and Indian” story, which the author calls “true and important,” but which many Native Americans find objectionable, a more in-depth discussion of it is warranted here. The solid bibliography does include some fine resources, such as 1621: A New Look at Thanksgiving (2001) by Catherine O’Neill Grace and Margaret M. Bruchac. (author’s note, chronology, index) (Nonfiction. 8-12)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8229-6
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Awash in mighty squalls, tales of heroism and melodramatic chapter headings like “The Lady Elgin: Death in the Darkness,” these marine yarns recount the violent ends of nine of the more than 6,000 ships that have “left the bottoms of Lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan, and Superior…littered with their wreckage and the bones of the people who sailed on them” over the past four centuries. For added value, Butts heads each shipwreck chapter with a photo or image of the unfortunate vessel. He then closes with so many Great Lakes monster sightings that they take on an aura of authenticity just by their very number, an effect aided and abetted by his liberal use of primary sources. Younger readers who might get bogged down in Michael Varhola’s more thorough Shipwrecks and Lost Treasures: Great Lakes (2008)—or turned off by its invented dialogue and embroidered details—will find these robust historical accounts more digestible and at least as engrossing. The bibliography is dominated by Canadian sources, as befitting the book’s origin, but there's plenty here to interest American readers. (Nonfiction. 11-13)
Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-77049-206-6
Page Count: 88
Publisher: Tundra Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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