A history of Harlem’s all-black regiment and its exploits in France during the Great War is marred by uneven storytelling and inadequate documentation. Myers and Miles take their time with setup, providing histories of both African-Americans in combat and the conditions in Europe that led to the outbreak of WWI. Even when they reach the formation of the 15th New York National Guard, they back and fill in a dedication to exposition that leaves the reader wondering what the story is. The mobilization of the 15th—now the 369th—Infantry in France is similarly plagued with narrative snags, only occasionally offering up stories of bravery in combat that illustrate the courage of these men who fought to “make the world safe for democracy,” even as they lived in most undemocratic conditions. These anecdotes, and the quotations from soldiers and their families, are shockingly poorly sourced, with neither textual references nor chapter notes to complement the brief bibliography. The whole reads like a second draft, with clunky transitions and a diffusion of focus that drag down what could have been an enormously inspiring tale. (Nonfiction. 9-12)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-001136-X
Page Count: 160
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2005
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care.
In 1977, the oil carrier Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of oil into a formerly pristine Alaskan ocean inlet, killing millions of birds, animals, and fish. Despite a cleanup, crude oil is still there.
The Winters foretold the destructive powers of the atomic bomb allusively in The Secret Project (2017), leaving the actuality to the backmatter. They make no such accommodations to young audiences in this disturbing book. From the dark front cover, on which oily blobs conceal a seabird, to the rescuer’s sad face on the back, the mother-son team emphasizes the disaster. A relatively easy-to-read and poetically heightened text introduces the situation. Oil is pumped from the Earth “all day long, all night long, / day after day, year after year” in “what had been unspoiled land, home to Native people // and thousands of caribou.” The scale of extraction is huge: There’s “a giant pipeline” leading to “enormous ships.” Then, crash. Rivers of oil gush out over three full-bleed wordless pages. Subsequent scenes show rocks, seabirds, and sea otters covered with oil. Finally, 30 years later, animals have returned to a cheerful scene. “But if you lift a rock… // oil / seeps / up.” For an adult reader, this is heartbreaking. How much more difficult might this be for an animal-loving child?
Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care. (author’s note, further reading) (Informational picture book. 9-12)Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3077-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
Partly filling the historical gap between their New Americans: Colonial Times, 1620-1689 (1998) and A More Perfect Union: The Story of Our Constitution (1987), the Maestros examine King William’s War, Queen Anne’s War, the War of Jenkins’ Ear, and other half-forgotten conflicts usually lumped together as the French and Indian Wars. Concluding that these wars were fought for economic control of North America and paralleled the first stirrings of a sense of national unity, the authors trace the growth of trade routes and other lines of communication. They also pay close attention to the wars’ consistently lamentable effects on the Native American groups allied with either the French or the British forces. Though much of the fighting and strategic maneuvering took place in what is now Canada, the Maestros take their most widely angled views of territories that became part of the United States. With plenty of precisely drafted battle scenes, street plans, portraits, maps, and landscapes, plus a spread of additional information on topics as diverse as colonial money and the Iroquois League, they bring a formative era in our country’s history into sharp focus for young readers. (index) (Nonfiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2000
ISBN: 0-688-13450-5
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2000
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