Skywriting: Poems to Fly

Tracing the history of flight, this collection of poems celebrates the daring dreams of humans, from Icarus's doomed journey ("Tracing an angel's tracks, / he rose on wings of wax") to modern space shuttles. Hot-air balloons, blimps, and rockets are featured in order of their creation, with failures (such as the Minerva and Ornithopter) portrayed as often as successes (zeppelins, the Wright Brothers' Flyer, and the Concorde). Kubinyi's precise linework and sense of movement are well-matched to the mechanical subject matter and capture the spirit of flight across the ages; endnotes and a time line offer background information. Ages 10up. (Sept.)

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Gr 4-6--Thirteen poems celebrate innovations in flight, soaring chronologically from Icarus to the space shuttle Columbia. Not all of the airborne contraptions were successful, as in the humorous poem "Marquis d'Equevilley's Multiplane"; with an oval shape, "It was not bound/Ever to get off/the ground!" All but one of the poems rhyme, including the shape poem, "The Concorde 001." The free verse "LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin" sounds more textbook than poetic. Detailed pen-and-ink illustrations with pastel watercolors highlighting the colors of the sky, pilots, and hopeful crowds convey the excitement and wonder humans have experienced in the pursuit of flight. Endnotes offer a paragraph of introductory information about each attempt. A time line with one notable fact from each of the 13 years marked by these forms of flight, from 800 BC to AD 2002, is included. Lee Bennett Hopkins's Give Me Wings (Holiday House, 2010), which also features 13 poems about flight, is for a slightly younger audience.--Julie R. Ranelli, Queen Anne's County Free Library, Stevensville, MD