Peter Lippman's America

Kindergarten-Grade 3 No purple mountain majesty here. No story or information eitherjust a hodgepodge of assorted information, much of it so oversimplified that it leads to misconceptions. Lippman breaks the country into subdivisions of North, South, East and West, and then attempts to capture the essence of each area. In this attempt to find differences, he ignores similarities among the "The East is famous for its big cities." (So much for Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles!) On the West Coast, "kids of all ages can play electronic games." These sweeping generalizations that serve as text will leave children puzzled, befuddled and misinformed. Lippman's cartoons on alternating textless double-page spreads, as well as the smaller ones that accompany the brief text, are busily amusing, as they show an assortment of Americansmost of them at play or eating. Peter Lippman's America is too personal to share widely. Trev Jones, "School Library Journal" Copyright 2002 Reed Business Infor