Non-Fiction: May 2006 Archives

A glossary and list of resources make this a particularly practical book – a number of the resources listed are Australia-biaised, this presents few problems for the web-based resources, however, for land-based centres hefty travel costs are likely to be incurred!

Testimony from a number of real life people and detailed yet sensitively written descriptions and explanations of the various stages of puberty and the feelings and anxieties these might elicit, help to normalise situations that can often feel isolating. “Puberty Boy” has exceptionally high production values - it could almost be a coffee table book! – and its considerate, thoughtful written style combine to make this one of the stand-out books on the market.

A map at the back of the book features indented photographs of the children showing the areas in which they live. The book highlights the way childrens’s environments affect their upbringing with regard to climate, culture and familial position.

Kate Petty is shortlisted this year for the Aventis Junior Science award with "The Global Garden". Look out for “Bicycles”, “Playtime” and “Home” which are available as part of the same series as "Hair", published in association with Oxfam who aim to raise awareness of lifestyles and culture across the globe through their publishing arm.

As wioth previous Frances Lincoln books,"Hair" features well-targetted guidance on the cover to aid its integrated use within the classroom.

It offers a fascinating and highly readable guide into the worlds of the paranormal, giving you all the lowdown and presenting all the facts impartially leaving you to decide for yourself what to believe. The various rationale that have been suggested to explain ghostly encounters are provided, alongside well-researched and detailed facts – did you know for example that UFO sightings aren’t a modern occurrence and way back as long ago as 1492 a sailor on board Columbus’s Santa Maria saw glittering things in the distance appearing and disappearing? With verified web-links and practical definitions to its more specialised diction – would you know a catopromancer from a coscinomancer? - the book is a great spring-board to finding out more and developing independent research skills .

Published by Allen and Unwin “Hauntings happen and ghosts get grumpy” is one book in a great series called “It’s true!” access website www.itstrue.com.au for more details on these compelling non-fiction books, rarely have facts been so flavoursome!

Ray Kroc, brainchild behind the franchising of the McDonald’s name claimed “The organisation cannot trust the individual; the individual must trust the organisation.” Through exploring fast food, and the world it has made, this book questions how far individuals are able to trust the vast power-wielding multi-national organisations who have so much become a part of familiar high-street iconography.

“Chew on this” is written by Eric Schlosser, author of the best-selling “Fast Food Nation”. It is very much a book of our time, and is a constituent of the back-lash that the fast-food industry – perhaps embodied in the fullest by McDonald’s – is currently suffering.

On June 19, 1997 Justice Bell delivered his verdict on the McLibel trial carried out against activists Helen Steel and David Morris. Despite having won the case and being awarded £60,000, in the verdict against allegations that the company’s marketing ‘exploit[s] children by using them, as more susceptible subjects of advertising, to pressurise their parents into going to McDonald’s’ was deemed to be true.

“Chew on this” is the highly political and politicised reaction against this. Aimed specifically at the 12+ market and backed by a major educational and promotional campaign which has seen “Chew on this” packs sent to over 5,000 schools, a soon-to-launch microsite with both adult and children’s zones www.chewonthisbook.co.uk , serialisation through the Guardian and extensive media coverage elsewhere, the book provides an important defence against one of the frightening statistics Schlosser provides for readers in the book – the staggering £300 million British food companies spend annually on advertising aimed specifically at children.

Split into bite-size chapters focusing on aspects including the development of the fast-food phenomenon, advertising and marketing aimed at creating consumers of children, food additives, meat production and obesity, “Chew on this” makes decidedly chilling facts digestible. Surprisingly this makes for compulsive, though frightening reading, and the observation that every pound spent in a fast-food restaurant is a vote in-favour of the politics and actions these companies have are imbued within provides food-for-thought that outweighs the ‘convenience’ such vendors purportedly provide.