China and Japan

School Library Journal

Gr 4-8-These concise compendia of East and South Asian history and textile culture will be well received among students laboring over detailed country profile and/or costume reports. Each book covers the history of dress up to approximately 1900, explaining in detail the garments and accessories of the lowest through the highest classes. The writing style is crisp and engaging, attending to historical accuracy while keeping an eye out for topics with high appeal. Frequent sidebars highlight concepts such as foot binding, undergarments, and the costumes associated with Hindu gods and goddesses. The texts include many transliterated technical terms and their definitions. These books provide a deeper historical background and tighter focus on garments than books in the "Eyewitness" series (DK) on ancient civilizations. The full-color illustrations are beautiful, but, strangely, there are no photographs of extant textiles. The pictures are not attributed, but look like skillful, hand-drawn reproductions of artworks from the periods they represent. Neither book includes a pronunciation guide and in Hammond's title Chinese words are not uniformly romanized. Additionally, each country section ends rather abruptly. Failings aside, these are useful titles and should complement material from the "Enchantment of the World" series (Children's) nicely.-Sophie R. Brookover, Mount Laurel Library, NJ Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.