Here are comments on a variety of new non-fiction titles:
ICE GHOSTS by Paul Watson tells the story of the Franklin Expedition which
was lost in the Arctic ice in 1845 and of the modern (2014) discovery of its
wreck.
The Franklin Expedition was
envisioned as an attempt to find the Northwest Passage between Europe and
China. However, numerous problems, (tainted
food, inadequate clothing) arose and the ships (HMS Erebus and Terror) with all
129 aboard were lost. Unsuccessful contemporary rescues were tried, including
those funded by Lady Jane Franklin. Inuit people had an oral history of some of
these events and Louie Kamookak, great grandson of an Inuit storyteller and
grandson of an Irish trader, decided to record those stories and to look for
the wreck. It is that adventure which
comprises the second part of ICE GHOSTS.
Paul Watson is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who
produced an extremely well-researched work, receiving a starred review from
Kirkus.
ICE GHOSTS made me think of Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson and
Endurance
by Alfred Lansing; two other non-fiction titles I would also highly recommend.
PORTRAIT REVOLUTION by Julia L. Kay is based on an
international collaborative art project, Julia Kay’s Portrait Party. Amazing! I do think that our
Art faculty and students will enjoy looking through this book which is filled
with “hundreds of portraits by and of artists from all over the world.” In her
introduction, Julia Kay explains some background on the project and its growth,
noting that she was not the “only self-portrait artist in the world hungry for
another face to stare at.” In addition,
it’s filled with comments and suggestions from the artists like, “I recommend
sharpening your pencil frequently during the drawing process” or “really study the
eyes and allow at least as much time for them as for the portrait as a whole.”
In this wonderful book, the portraits are created with
various media, such as charcoal, pen, markers, crayon, pastels, paints,
printmaking, digital media and even needle arts. PORTRAIT REVOLUTION also
contains sections with portraits by Style and by Theme, as well as some
information and contact links for Featured Artists. There’s even some suggestions for hosting a
portrait party which I hope our Art classes are able to do next year. Available
in print and as an eBook which could be displayed for class discussion.
We ordered DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR? by Harold Evans who also wrote and
compiled They Made America Great.
In fact, we own multiple copies of that latter work and use it
frequently for projects on inventors and inventions. In his newer book, Evans explains “why
writing well matters” and offers helpful writing directions in chapters titled The
Sentence Clinic and Every Word Counts.
In the section called Ten Shortcuts to Making
Yourself Clear, he advocates the use of active voice, specificity, fewer
adjectives, organization for clarity and more.
Evans includes many contemporary examples and quotes. Students, especially of journalism, will
benefit from reviewing these suggestions from Evans who has been an editor of The
Sunday Times, Conde Nast Traveler, and numerous other publications. Personally,
I would prefer a hard copy that I could annotate and fill with sticky notes, and
will have that chance shortly because publication in the US of DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR? is scheduled for
mid-May.
Those were very quick introductions to some new non-fiction
titles, but we will be adding more, particularly related to
business/economic, history and education themes in the next few weeks.
