Marie Curie (Snapshots Series): A Brilliant Life FROM THE CRITICS
School Library Journal
Gr 4-6-This biography begins with Curie's childhood in Poland and follows her life and career through her death in 1934. Each chapter spread includes a page of text facing an arrangement of small photographs, commentary, and a cartoonlike depiction of Curie addressing readers via a dialogue balloon: "I was fascinated by radiation and couldn't wait to begin studying it." Unfortunately, the explanations of the basic science of radium and the discovery of the element are a bit unclear. Still, some of the individual pictures (Antoine-Henri Becquerel's actual photographic plate) and photos of Curie with other scientists (one with a young Albert Einstein) are interesting and enhance the text, and the book has browsing appeal. Steve Parker's Marie Curie and Radium (Chelsea, 1995) is better for reports and makes the discovery easier to understand.-Susan Lissim, Dwight School, New York City Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
A fairly breathless biography delivers the facts in workmanlike style but without the spark of brilliance one might hope would be attached to the subject. Readers follow the pioneering physicist from her childhood and youth in Poland to her astonishing career in France with her husband, Pierre Curie. Much is told but little is shown as the narrative details Curie's struggles against ethnic and gender prejudice to get her education, her intense drive emphasized above all. Although occasional hints of the woman acknowledged to be one of the greatest minds in physics show through, Curie's later life is mostly presented as a bland catalogue of achievements. The design is pedestrian, each page of text faced with a page of illustrations and factoids; annoyingly, a little cartoon Curie walks the reader through these spreads, speech balloons offering such insights as, "I kept careful notes on everything, from making gooseberry jelly to experimenting in the lab." Although this offering may not inspire them, readers will discover plenty to appreciate in the subject. (chronology, list of museums, index) (Biography. 8-12)
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