Riveting.
A terrible explosion devastated Halifax, Nova Scotia, and a neighboring town in 1917, causing local residents and others miles away to act heroically in response to an unprecedented catastrophe.
Thousands of miles from the action of World War I, two ships headed for the conflict collided in Halifax Harbour and precipitated an astonishing disaster. On December 6, 1917, the Mont Blanc and the Imo were slated to deliver supplies to Europe. “In less than five minutes, an explosion—the likes of which the world had never seen before—and a tsunami had destroyed homes, factories, and businesses, wiping them from the land as though they had never existed.” Rescue was hampered by a blizzard the next day. Nearly 2,000 people perished in the town that a few years earlier had helped with the remains of Titanic victims. Sibert Award–winning author Walker (Secrets of a Civil War Submarine, 2005) tells this story with detailed immediacy, focusing on five families affected as well as the accident itself. Tension builds as the hours before the explosion are described. The attempts to provide relief as well as to rebuild add another level of interest to the unfolding story. Despite the immense tragedy, the satisfying concluding chapter tells how loss and heroism are remembered by descendants of townspeople and those who helped. Period photographs contribute to the high level of authenticity. Source notes reveal how much came from personal narratives and interview comments of those involved.
Riveting. (Nonfiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Nov. 22, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8945-5
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 6, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2011
A bit unfocused but unusual of theme and gratifyingly broad of both historical and geographical scope.
Ten tales of wartime peril and heroism during huge storms, amid trackless mountains, and in the face of other natural barriers and disasters.
Kyi leads off with “Hannibal vs. the Alps” and closes with “Allied Forces vs. the Tora Bora Caves” in Afghanistan in 2001. In between, she chronicles ordeals including Napoleon’s bitter retreat through the Russian winter, a World War II task force’s encounter with Typhoon Cobra, the 1822 battle on the slopes of a volcano that freed Quito from Spanish rule, and a still-ongoing standoff between India and Pakistan for control of the wildly inhospitable Siachen Glacier. Though the author arranges her chapters in no particular order and drifts from her premise in one that pits the U.S. Army’s “tunnel rats” against Viet Cong in the man-made Cù Chi tunnels, she tells a tale that is both coherent and laced with vivid observations and details. Also, an overdesigned layout that features abrupt changes of background color, wedged-in sidebars, smudgy decorative elements, and an uneasy mix of period images with modern photos and melodramatic new illustrations in diverse styles is more distraction than enhancement. Still, the basic material is solid enough to keep readers absorbed.
A bit unfocused but unusual of theme and gratifyingly broad of both historical and geographical scope. (bibliography, source notes, index) (Nonfiction. 11-14)Pub Date: April 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-55451-794-7
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Annick Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2016
Students of American history who are not familiar with the artist’s work can find these paintings elsewhere but will...
A broad overview of the American Revolution’s causes and course, paired to select works from a renowned and prolific history painter.
Axelrod has written several well-received studies in American history for adults (Lost Destiny, 2015, etc.), but though he covers the main events here, he too often resorts to simplistic claims like “The Declaration of Independence said that everyone is ‘created equal.’ For this reason, the Continental Congress decided to separate from Britain.” He does draw attention to elements in the accompanying oils, which are sometimes action scenes but more often formal portraits or reconstructions of significant moments. Künstler paints with absorbing realism and attention to period accuracy—sometimes to the extent that the narrative content plays second fiddle to the close focus on exact details of uniforms and settings. His scenes are not always shown to best effect here either, as portions of the larger illustrations vanish into gutters, and some suffer from the reproduction. The artist is best known for his Civil War paintings, a relative few of which are presented in the co-published The Civil War: 1861-1865 with a scanty but reasonably coherent text by James I. Robertson Jr. (Civil War! America Becomes One Nation, 1992). Closing timelines and lists of key figures in both volumes include some additional details.
Students of American history who are not familiar with the artist’s work can find these paintings elsewhere but will appreciate the showcase—more, likely, than they do the sketchy narrative accounts. (Nonfiction. 10-12)Pub Date: May 17, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7892-1253-5
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Abbeville Kids
Review Posted Online: March 29, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
