In the late 13th century, 17-year-old Marco Polo set out for Cathay (China) with his father and uncle. They followed the legendary Silk Road to the palaces of the Kublai Khan, for whom they worked for 17 years before returning to Venice, where Polo later told his story. Markle describes his adventures chronologically for young readers. Most episodes are related on a single page opposite Terrazzini’s attractive, detailed mixed-media illustrations, rendered in dark tones that reflect the dangers of the journey. A separate entry on each page includes information about an animal that Polo might have seen. In spite of the title, as with others in this series the animals are an addendum rather than the focus of the narrative. This attractive introduction to Polo’s famous trip stumbles twice, misnaming the Khan’s summer home and omitting from the map Polo’s travels to India and return home. A fourth volume in the author’s Explorers series, Animals Charles Darwin Saw (ISBN: 978-0-8118-5049-0, illustrated by Zina Saunders), appeared in February 2009 in conjunction with Darwin’s 200th anniversary. (glossary, for more information, index) (Nonfiction. 7-10)
Pub Date: May 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-8118-5051-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While Josephine Poole and Angela Barrett’s Joan of Arc (1998) focused on Joan as a saint, this spirited but reverent telling emphasizes Joan as a hero. In the little village of DomrÇmy, Joan did not learn to read or write, but she listened to stories of the saints’ great deeds, worked with her parents, and aided the sick. When St. Michael the Archangel first appeared to her in a great light, she was 13; he told her she would save France, and the people supported her, outfitting her with horse and armor, and a white banner with the golden lilies that symbolized the French king. All the highlights of Joan’s story are elegantly recounted here: her recognition of the king hidden in the crowd, her victory at OrlÇans, Charles’s coronation, her capture, abandonment, trial, and death by burning at the stake. Rayevsky’s drypoint and etching illustrations use the muted colors and sepia backgrounds of old prints; the simple, sinuous line and stylized faces are particularly evocative. His visual trope of a flowerlike flame in the fireplace of Joan’s home is startlingly recreated in the final image of Joan at the stake. (Picture book/biography. 6-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 15, 1999
ISBN: 0-8234-1424-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1999
A useful history covering the ancient practices of bartering and using commodities (salt, grain, tobacco) as media of exchange, plus the development of metal and paper currency and contemporary cashless methods of payment; handsomely illustrated with many expansive landscape paintings resembling those in the Maestros' The Discovery of the America (1991), maps, and meticulous drawings of coins and bills. A simpler, more focused treatment than Cribb's Money (in the Eyewitness format, 1990). (Nonfiction/Picture book. 7-10.)
Pub Date: March 22, 1993
ISBN: 0-395-56242-2
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1993
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