Saints; Kings and Queens

These are simplified versions of titles which first appeared in 1996 in a series, 'Famous Lives'. A differentiated text like this, which has to fit around illustrations chosen (and placed on the page) to suit something more sophisticated, is difficult to do well. Younger children or children with special needs, the audience for which the books are intended, demand at least as much care as older or more capable children. For these books, Sauvain has had the help of Norah Granger, a consultant in early years education.

Sauvain and Granger have taken care. In Kings and Queens, faced with matters like the English Civil War or the English Reformation, they have often come up with simple historical explanations acceptable to 7- or 8- year-olds: 'The Pope would not let Henry marry again. Henry was furious. He old people to obey him in future, not the Pope.' Sometimes, they are not so successful. 'He [Henry] was now a cruel man. He took land away from the monks and nuns and shut down their abbeys' is not a sufficient explanation of the dissolution of the monasteries. The subsequent paragraph hints at a straightforward motive beyond arbitrary malice (he needed the money) but does not make the connection.

Writing at this level and on subjects like these, it is hard for an author to resist offering judgements based on an assessment of personality or popularity: on which counts Henry was a bad king and Elizabeth I a good queen. Saints lends itself more readily to this approach; since, by the usual definition, its subjects are good anyway. Wisely, Sauvain leaves his readers to draw their own conclusions about what makes a saint.

The text fits with the illustrations and these are helpfully labelled, although more attention could have been paid to the captions. Readers will be intrigued, for instance, by the strange animals that Queen Victoria is inspecting in Windsor Great Park (I think they are llamas) but Sauvain says nothing about them. The portrait of St Francis clearly shows the stigmata, but they are not explained. The glossary is good but Wayland should have tried harder with the bibliography, where the level of the recommended books does not match the text, and the index, which largely repeats the contents page.