My Head Is Full of Books: Steve Jobs: Insanely Great. A graphic biography by Jessie Hartland

"Outside a dog a book is man's best friend, inside a dog it is too dark to read!" -Groucho Marx========="The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid." -Jane Austen========="I don’t believe in the kind of magic in my books. But I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a good book."-JK Rowling========"I spend a lot of time reading." -Bill Gates=========“Ahhh. Bed, book, kitten, sandwich. All one needed in life, really.” -Jacqueline Kelly=========

Saturday, March 7, 2015

Steve Jobs: Insanely Great. A graphic biography by Jessie Hartland

The journey is the reward.-S.J.

Last week I received boxes and boxes of Advanced Readers copies of the books from the librarian at PLU. I couldn't believe the haul. Many of the books in the boxes have already been published so I made them available to students and to other librarians in the district to review. But there were also twenty or so AR books that have yet to be published so, for the first time in my career, I am actually reviewing a book not yet in publication. This is one you will want to put on your book order, believe me!

Steve Jobs: Insanely Great is a graphic biography by Jessie Hartland. It starts with a timeline of Steve's life and then follows that timeline to highlight events that led to Steve's many, many accomplishments.

To be honest I have never read another book about Steve Jobs and only knew a bit about him prior to reading this, so when I say that this book is spectacular I am not making any comparisons. There is another biography about Steve in my library which was published for teens and has been fairly popular, Steve Jobs--- the Man Who Thought Different: a biography by Karen Blumenthal. I think Hartland's book will fill a niche and attract different readers to it, which is wonderful.

The graphics in Steve Jobs: Insanely Great are simple and comical. Some frames are quite busy while others convey just one simple point. When the pages got to "busy" I found myself just skipping ahead which was probably the idea Hartland wanted to convey---Jobs was so busy and creative that sometimes others just couldn't keep up.

At first I was critical of some of the graphics thinking that the drawings could have been done by me or one of my students, then I got off my high-horse and just settled in to read and enjoy the book without criticising it anymore, especially as I was learning something new with the turn of each page.

I am so excited about this book I can't wait for July. Already I am making plans for sharing this AR book with students and other librarians in the district and it is already on my summer book order.

(I was not paid anything to review this book by the publisher Schwartz and Wade. This book will be available for purchase in July 2015.)