75. The Revolutionary John Adams

The Revolutionary John Adams by Cheryl Harness

Pages: 39
Ages: 8+
Finished: Apr. 9, 2009
First Published: 2003
Genre: childrens, biography
Rating: 3/5

Reason for Reading: Read aloud to the 8yo as part of our curriculum.

First sentence:

On the 19th of October 1735 in a cottage at the foot of Penn's Hill in the village of Braintree, not quite a mile from where the Atlantic Ocean meets the coast of New England, Susanna Adams had a son.

Comments: Part of a series of biographies published by National Geographic, the author also illustrated this book profusely. Published in an oversized picture-book format the pages are colourful and full of gorgeous illustrations throughout that will keep the attention of any child. The text is written in an engaging, informative style and both the 8yo and I, who knew nothing of the subject before hand, learned a lot. The book goes from Adams' birth until his death and was an interesting read. Not until the Revolution did the use of dates become too extensive that they made the reading turn dry, so I started skipping over them and said things like "in January" or "then one day". Dates do not keep a child intrigued in the story. Otherwise a nice book that does it's job well.