A bland alternative to You Wouldn’t Want to Be an Aztec Sacrifice (2013) and other entries in that rousing series.
In a tongue-limbering recitation, Tlenamacac (fire priest) Ten Vulture describes his city, his gods, and his training.
“It’s the year 1518 and you’re in the middle of the Aztec Empire,” he burbles, with a fine disregard for verisimilitude. “Aztecs rule, ok?” Ten Vulture then introduces Itztlacoliuhqui, Xipe Totec (“god of flayed skins…”), and eight other deities whose names are left to readers to sound out. Following this, he retraces his history from being chosen for the priesthood through games, wars, and blood sacrifices (with a bit of cannibalism thrown in). Despite multiple references to gruesome ritual practices, though, in the cartoon illustrations the occasional spatters of gore are almost unnoticeable. Aloisi populates his scenes with brown-skinned, bare-chested boys and men sporting elaborate headdresses or topknots (the few women in view are discreetly covered up). The attempt at historical accuracy seems to die with the scribbles that stand in for Aztec writing. At least most of the kanji in the co-published How to Live Like a Samurai Warrior and the hieroglyphics in How to Live Like an Egyptian Mummy Maker seem to be more than generic scribbles. These and How to Live Like a Caribbean Pirate (who were nearly all, at least according to illustrator Tatio Viano, white) are similarly framed as narratives by young participants.
A bland alternative to You Wouldn’t Want to Be an Aztec Sacrifice (2013) and other entries in that rousing series. (index, glossary) (Nonfiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5124-0628-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Hungry Tomato/Lerner
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An insightful glimpse into a key period in Alcott’s life and women in nursing.
During the Civil War, Louisa May Alcott served as a volunteer nurse, caring for Union soldiers in Washington, D.C., between December 12, 1862, and January 21, 1863. This well-researched biographical vignette explores the brief but pivotal episode in Alcott’s life.
An abolitionist, Alcott longed to fight in the Union Army, but she did her part by serving as a nurse. Alcott met the female nursing requirements: She was 30, plain, strong and unmarried. Krull describes her challenging solo journey from Massachusetts by train and ship and her lonely arrival in Washington at the “overcrowded, damp, dark, airless” hospital. For three weeks she nursed and provided “motherly” support for her “boys” before succumbing to typhoid fever, forcing her to return to Massachusetts. Krull shows how Alcott’s short tenure as a nurse affected her life, inspiring her to publish letters she sent home as Hospital Sketches. This honest account of the war earned rave reviews and taught Alcott to use her own experiences in her writing, leading to Little Women. Peppered with Alcott’s own words, the straightforward text is enhanced by bold, realistic illustrations rendered in digital oils on gessoed canvas. A somber palette reinforces the grim wartime atmosphere, dramatically highlighting Alcott in her red cape and white nurse’s apron.
An insightful glimpse into a key period in Alcott’s life and women in nursing. (notes on women in medicine and the Battle of Fredericksburg, sources, map) (Picture book/biography. 9-11)Pub Date: March 5, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-8027-9668-4
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Walker
Review Posted Online: Oct. 23, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2012
Sentimental of plotline but informative and breathlessly paced.
The seventh (chronologically earliest) entry in the series pitches a young former slave into the middle of the Civil War’s pivotal battle.
Having saved a Union soldier named Henry Green by hurling a live skunk at his Confederate captors, young Thomas finds himself and his little sister Birdie adopted by Green’s unit. Three weeks, an ambush and a quick march later, Thomas unexpectedly finds himself in the thick of the fighting—possibly on Missionary Ridge itself, though the author doesn’t provide a specific location. Rather than go into details of the battle, Tarshis offers broad overviews of slavery and the war’s course (adding more about the latter in an afterword that includes the text of the Gettysburg Address). She folds these into quick pictures of military camp life and the violence-laced fog of war. Afterward, Thomas and Birdie are reunited with their older cousin Clem, who had been sold away, and make good on a promise to Green (who doesn’t survive) to settle with his Vermont parents and attend the school taught by his sweetheart.
Sentimental of plotline but informative and breathlessly paced. (Q&A, annotated reading list) (Historical fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-45936-5
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 25, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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