(4) YA In this sympathetic, well-documented, even scholarly biography of Baruch Spinoza, the seventeenth-century Dutch philosopher outcast by his Jewish community for questioning traditional doctrine, Lehmann covers and interprets the events of his life, including his publications, applauding the way he championed the human faculty of reason. Many period illustrations expand the dense text, though they're often dark and captioned in very small type. Bib., ind.

Reviewer: Frieda F. Bostian

(2) YA Translated by William Rodarmor. Three boys pick up a seemingly innocuous computer game while in London. Edgier than most virtual reality scenarios, this novel throws its characters into realities of historical combat, as the boys find themselves, via the game, in Verdun, Guernica, and Bosnia, enacting desperate battles. The antiwar message is loud and clear but not simplistic; the book is less about the folly of war-gaming than the dangers of hatred.

Reviewer: Roger Sutton | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 1999