A Picture Book of Florence Nightingale

by David A. Adler, John Wallner (Illustrator), Alexandra Wallner (Illustrator)

Overview

Traces the life of the nineteenth-century English woman who followed her calling to work in hospitals and improve the conditions under which the sick were treated.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780823412846
Publisher:	Holiday House
Publication date:	01/01/1992
Series:	Picture Book Biography Series
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	32
Product dimensions:	9.54(w) x 8.01(h) x 0.18(d)
Lexile:	AD820L (what's this?)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

David A. Adler is the author of many popular books for children, including biographies, math books, and Judaica. His strong interest in history and biography led to his bestselling Picture Book Biography series. He lives in New York State with his wife and family.

John Wallner has illustrated dozens of books for children, including David A. Adler's Honest Abe Lincoln: Easy-to-Read Stories about Abraham Lincoln, a Bank Street Best Book of the Year. Alexandra Wallner has written and illustrated many biographies for children about remarkable people, including Lucy Maud Montgomery, Grandma Moses, Abigail Adams, and Beatrix Potter. She and her husband live in Mexico and often collaborate on their books.

Alexandra Wallner has written and illustrated many biographies for children about remarkable people, including Lucy Maud Montgomery, Grandma Moses, Abigail Adams, and Beatrix Potter. She and her husband live in Mexico and often collaborate on their books.

Editorial Reviews

Gr 1-3-- While the Wallners' bright, line-and-watercolor pictures will appeal to younger readers, Adler's text is disappointing and at times frustrating; the simple language is often at odds with the more complex story it is trying to convey. Some of the incidents in Nightingale's life are poorly explained, without giving the necessary historical background for children to understand the events fully. It's unlikely that eight-year-olds will understand what exactly Florence detested about being the `` . . . same sort of wife her mother was, . . . `` `making society and arranging domestic things' '' or the importance of her being presented to Queen Victoria. When readers are told that England ``. . . joined in the Crimean War against Russia'' most won't know who they joined or why. There are also puzzling gaps in Nightingale's religious development and her transition from a sheltered Victorian girl to an unconventional, strong-minded woman who transformed her profession and set the standards for modern nursing. As a result, she sounds merely eccentric, even mysterious. A better title, geared to slightly older readers, is Dorothy Turner's Florence Nightingale (Watts, 1986; o.p.). --Cyrisse Jaffee, Newton Public Schools, MA6

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