"Smartly designed and easy to understand, Abel and Madden’s text is an edifying course in creating comics. Comprised of 15 comprehensive lessons, readers are taught the basic elements necessary to conceptualize and produce their own comics. Assuming an audience range from individuals to a group, this pedagogical survey is written to serve a wide array of learners . . . Extensive backmatter, including helpful appendices on such topics as homework critiques, and a considerable bibliography round out the volume. This erudite study should leave its readers with a greater understanding and appreciation of the command one must possess to create graphic media. A valuable resource for all interested in the field."—Kirkus Reviews

"[An] engaging and informative account of Afghan life and politics interwoven with a teen's reactions to his first visit to his family's native land. Because of [Hyder's] background and connections, his interest and knowledge of Afghan history and politics, and his language skills, Akbar was involved in his father's work in ways that most teens can only dream of. Readers are rewarded with an inside look at Afghan reconstruction that is both informative and appealing. The teen admires his father and his father's friends immensely; he dreams of being personally involved in nation-building. Readers will come away from this memoir with a strong desire to see into the young man's future and that of the country that has so entranced him."—School Library Journal, starred review

"To hold this range of beliefs in the palm of your hand is as fine, as grounding, as it was hearing them first on the radio. Heartfelt, deeply cherished beliefs, doctrines for living (yet none of them doctrinaire). Ideas and ideals that nourish. You can see it in their faces, in the photos in this book. And read it in their words. I'm so proud that NPR helped carry this Edward R. Murrow tradition into a new century. And so glad to have it in print, to encounter again and again."—Susan Stamberg, special correspondent, National Public Radio

"Nick of Time is a blast—the best of Robert Louis Stevenson, Horatio Hornblower, and Harry Potter. The kid in me loved it, and so did the adult.”—James Patterson

"His best work—it's terrific, piercing, and funny. The novel demonstrates every kind of strength."—David Lipsky, The New York Times Book Review

"Despite the substantial number of Holocaust memoirs that have been published, The Girl in the Green Sweater manages to touch us in an unexpected way, revealing highs and lows in man’s capacity for evil, as well as his capacity to love life and other human beings. Through the eyes of the child that Krystyna Chiger was in Lvov, Poland, in 1939 we see the whole moral universe."—Naomi Ragen, author of The Saturday Wife and The Covenant

"[Dawson has] been obsessed with the British rock band [Queen] and its late front man, Freddie Mercury, since he was a child living in England, and they're the madeleine that triggers memories of his life's significant events . . . Dawson's black-and-white artwork is smoothly paced, fluid caricature in the vein of Joe Sacco or Alex Robinson, and his narration neatly evokes the hyperdramatic worldview of a teenager . . . anyone who was ever obsessed with a creator will recognize some of the whimsical story."—Publishers Weekly

"De Rosnay's U.S. debut fictionalizes the 1942 Paris roundups and deportations, in which thousands of Jewish families were arrested, held at the Vélodrome d'Hiver outside the city, then transported to Auschwitz. Forty-five-year-old Julia Jarmond, American by birth, moved to Paris when she was 20 and is married to the arrogant, unfaithful Bertrand Tézac, with whom she has an 11-year-old daughter. Julia writes for an American magazine and her editor assigns her to cover the 60th anniversary of the Vél' d'Hiv' roundups. Julia soon learns that the apartment she and Bertrand plan to move into was acquired by Bertrand's family when its Jewish occupants were dispossessed and deported 60 years before. She resolves to find out what happened to the former occupants: Wladyslaw and Rywka Starzynski, parents of 10-year-old Sarah and four-year-old Michel. The more Julia discovers—especially about Sarah, the only member of the Starzynski family to survive—the more she uncovers about Bertrand's family, about France and, finally, herself. Already translated into 15 languages, the novel is De Rosnay's 10th (but her first written in English, her first language). It beautifully conveys Julia's conflicting loyalties, and makes Sarah's trials so riveting, her innocence so absorbing, that the book is hard to put down."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Some memories are like the rubble in a city strafed and scarred by war. Reconnoitering into the past, we pick through the debris, eager to know old truths but fearful of what we may find. Some people choose psychoanalysis to make this treacherous journey . . . Ari Folman did it with Waltz with Bashir . . . The message of the futility of war has rarely been painted with such bold strokes."—Mary Corliss, Time magazine

"When the Soviet Union chucked Sputnik into space in 1957, it galvanized America to come from behind and win the space race. The federal government opened its checkbook to finance an array of projects. Students shifted to new subjects like astronautical engineering and Russian studies to help the United States understand and eclipse the Soviet Union. The moon shot inspired a patriotic nation and produced useful commercial technologies along the way. The space race was expensive, but it worked. Thomas L. Friedman’s latest book is a plea for a new Sputnik moment. His breezy tour of America’s energy policy documents a nation that has become dangerously dependent on fossil fuels . . . Mr. Friedman’s voice is compelling and will be widely heard . . . Mr. Friedman’s strength is his diagnosis of our energy and environmental nightmares . . . The most intriguing chapter in Mr. Friedman’s book is his last, which poses the toughest challenge. Can America be like China, where a visionary government can impose a new direction on the country in the face of national emergency? Or will America devolve into a country that is so mired in red tape and local opposition that it builds absolutely nothing anywhere, near anything? Societies like that get stuck because they can’t embrace new technologies, like the cherished wind turbines and the power lines needed to carry their current . . . Heads will be nodding across airport lounges, as readers absorb Mr. Friedman’s common sense about how America and the world are dangerously addicted to cheap fossil fuels while we recklessly use the atmosphere as a dumping ground for carbon dioxide. The Sputnik is heading into orbit, thanks to high energy prices, growing fear of the changing climate and pleas like Mr. Friedman’s. But whether we as a nation—and with us, the world—are really prepared to do anything to solve the problem is still in doubt."—David Victor, The New York Times

"First, think a beginner's guide to philosophy . . . Next, imagine a fantasy novel—something like a modern-day version of Through the Looking Glass. Meld these disparate genres, and what do you get? Well, what you get is an improbable international bestseller . . . [A] tour de force."—Time

"In this courtship and marriage biography, the author examines an unlikely but powerful bond between cousins, the Origins of the Species scientist and the religious devotee love of his life. Beginning with Darwin's 'to marry or not to marry' pro/con lists through Emma editing Charles' autobiography so that it would be less 'offensive,' the couple provided for each other sounding board, respected opposition, and beloved soulmate . . . The volume provides a unique blend of romance, scientific observations, explanations of medical practices prevalent in the early-nineteenth century, and opportunities to examine scientific discoveries and religious beliefs in detail."—Patti Sylvester Spencer, VOYA