Submarines

School Library Journal

Gr 4-6-These books are a disappointing jumble of photos, illustrations, captions, and very limited texts. Bright, colorful covers will attract young military enthusiasts, but not much information will be gained from so few sentences per page. The blue or green caption boxes, superimposed on the images, have headings accompanied by chevrons that point to nothing in particular. Some statements are inaccurate or misleading. Battlefield refers to the SR71 Blackbird in the present tense when it has been retired for several years. The text is sloppy in places, with unclear pronouns and meaningless slang. Carriers has a caption that describes a ship as sailing into its home port of San Diego, but the Arizona Memorial can be seen in the photo. Submarines is not consistent with its use of USS and SSN when referring to nuclear subs and states that Pearl Harbor is in the Philippines. While current material on this topic is needed, these titles do not have enough content to warrant purchase.-Eldon Younce, Harper Elementary School, KS Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.