(3) YA Life for fifteen-year-old Aaron, who picks through the garbage piles of Cairo, Egypt, looking for pieces of glass to resell, is hard enough--then he's disowned by his family for stealing. This story of abject third-world poverty is a grippingly realistic version of stories with a more speculative nature, namely Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi and Trash by Andy Mulligan.

Reviewer: Jonathan Hunt

(4) 4-6 Cities Through Time series. Illustrated by Bob Moulder. These books deliver what their titles promise by a combination of readable text, archival photos and drawings, boxed quotations, and static illustrations. The books consider lower classes as well as middle and upper. Background artwork often creates a problem for textual legibility, but generally these are accurate, brief surveys of the cities and the culture that has evolved in each. Time lines are appended. Bib., ind.

Reviewer: Frieda F. Bostian