A carefully diverse roster of “dominant dames” demonstrably capable of breaking gender molds…along with records and/or heads.
A united nations of leading ladies of the past and present, commingled with luminaries in the arts, sciences, and annals of piracy.
Leading off with full-page portraits of Aretha Franklin and Joan of Arc to herald her glittering gallery’s expansive purview, Drimmer dishes up short introductions to over 100 strong women who either headed states or shone in academic or public spheres. Gathered thematically, each comes with a picture—some true to period but many done in newer styles, including lots of stock images looking like models in costume—and a biographical note. Along with well-documented royals from Hatshepsut to the Elizabeths I and II, Catherine the Great to Anne Boleyn (“her reign was cut short”), readers will get ganders at such non-Western achievers as Himiko, Japan’s earliest known ruler, and Ashanti rebel Yaa Asantewaa. Venturing into realms beyond the geopolitical, Trimmer profiles Simone Biles and other “Sovereigns of Sports,” “Monarchs of Music,” “Legendary Leaders” like Wonder Woman (the film version), and assorted aeronauts, astronauts, and “Nobel Nobles.” A number of male monarchs, mostly from the co-published Book of Kings, sneak into side boxes, and occasional featurettes focus on queenly armor, bling, and emblems. Considering the pervasive evidence of bloody-mindedness, readers in search of “lean in” role models may justly scoff at the closing tally of positive queenly character traits.
A carefully diverse roster of “dominant dames” demonstrably capable of breaking gender molds…along with records and/or heads. (index) (Collective biography. 9-12)Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4263-3535-8
Page Count: 176
Publisher: National Geographic Kids
Review Posted Online: Aug. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2019
Bial (A Handful of Dirt, p. 299, etc.) conjures up ghostly images of the Wild West with atmospheric photos of weathered clapboard and a tally of evocative names: Tombstone, Deadwood, Goldfield, Progress, Calamity Jane, Wild Bill Hickock, the OK Corral. Tracing the life cycle of the estimated 30,000 ghost towns (nearly 1300 in Utah alone), he captures some echo of their bustling, rough-and-tumble past with passages from contemporary observers like Mark Twain: “If a man wanted a fight on his hands without any annoying delay, all he had to do was appear in public in a white shirt or stove-pipe hat, and he would be accommodated.” Among shots of run-down mining works, dusty, deserted streets, and dark eaves silhouetted against evening skies, Bial intersperses 19th-century photos and prints for contrast, plus an occasional portrait of a grizzled modern resident. He suggests another sort of resident too: “At night that plaintive hoo-hoo may be an owl nesting in a nearby saguaro cactus—or the moaning of a restless ghost up in the graveyard.” Children seeking a sense of this partly mythic time and place in American history, or just a delicious shiver, will linger over his tribute. (bibliography) (Nonfiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-618-06557-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
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
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