BARRINGTON ATLAS OF THE GREEK AND ROMAN WORLD

Name: BARRINGTON ATLAS OF THE GREEK AND ROMAN WORLD
Author: Princeton University Press

developed by Princeton University Press ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 5, 2013

Reasonably priced, it invites long hours of poring over: This belongs in the iPad of every student of the classics and...

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A state-of-the-art atlas of the ancient world, both as it was known to the Greeks and Romans and as it is known to scholars today.

Responding to a call in the 1980s to rescue classicists’ cartographic tools from their disgraceful condition, the Barrington Atlas has been in print since 2000. Its conversion into an electronic edition brings with it only a problem of scale, for the original stands 19 inches tall, something no tablet can accomplish at full-page view. Still, the 102 maps in the atlas translate well to electronic form, and if the atlas is not immediately easy to bookmark and perhaps more difficult to navigate than is strictly necessary, it contains some fine features—to say nothing of thoroughly beautiful maps that sing under retina view. The map of first-century Britain is a case in point, carefully annotating the locations of the iron mines that made conquest of the islands so important. Similarly, the maps devoted to Germania are full of blank spots; the Romans were sure only that terrible danger lurked therein. Drawn to consistent scale, the maps reveal the astonishing depth of ancient knowledge about the world, even if that knowledge was tinged with superstition and mythology (the map of the Caucasus showing, for instance, that beyond those frozen mountains lay the lands of the mythical race called the Hyperborae, or “beyond-the-north-wind-people”). The work of hundreds of scholars, reviewers, cartographers and technical staff went into this app, and it shows. As the editors observe at the end of their introduction, “Its maps should form the basis of branching out further in every direction,” a process whose fruits we’ll soon hope to see.

Reasonably priced, it invites long hours of poring over: This belongs in the iPad of every student of the classics and ancient history. (Requires iOS 7 and above.)

Pub Date: Dec. 5, 2013

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Princeton Univ.

Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2014

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Awards & Accolades

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New York Times Bestseller

DEVOLUTION

by Max Brooks ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 16, 2020

A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.

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656

Our Verdict

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New York Times Bestseller

Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).

A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.

A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.

Pub Date: June 16, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine

Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020

Categories:

GENERAL SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE | SCIENCE FICTION

- BOOK TO SCREEN
Devolution Movie Adaptation in Works

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.