A fine work of fact, beautifully illustrated, and lightly chronicling the life and work of Nikola Tesla.

This is a brief overview of his life, starting with a dash about his life in Croatia and his arrival in New York. It covers his work with Thomas Edison, including, but not focusing on, his ill treatment by Edison, and then working with George Westinghouse. His patents and accomplishments are also mentioned.

The book ends rather abruptly, as if the final few pages had to be cut for space, which is really a shame because it would be a better book for having a little more information at the end, and then a less ambiguous ending.

The illustrations perfectly suit the time period and the tone of the book. Masterfully done. In fact, I enjoyed the art so much, that I searched for other books illustrated by Bill Slavin. (We own about a dozen titles.)

This is a factual and well-illustrated introduction to Nikola Tesla for children, and should encourage them to learn more about him and his achievements. I find him very fascinating, and feel rather that he is at times maligned and portrayed as a horrible person in the USA. This book was refreshing, as it focused factually on his work. Will definitely request for our library's collection.


**eARC Netgalley** ( )

Not a bad book, but what a weird ending. It was like the last page was just tacked on for no good reason.

I'm always down with books that bring a bit of narrative structure to history, and this does exactly that. It avoids mentioning some of the more disturbing details of the Edison/Tesla feud without having to revise history to do it, which I appreciated. Still, I can imagine kids asking about the motivation of what they're reading, and parents being unable to answer.

A fun book, but an odd one. ( )

This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

This book is a decent introduction to Nikola Tesla, just a few personal and historical highlights, only a little depth. Handy non-fiction biography for science inclined elementary students.

A very good younger-age biographical picture book. It can be hard to find a balance that includes enough about the figure without being too long or too technical. The illustrations are very well done too. While there could be more emphasis on Tesla's inventions, you could easily overpower a children's book like that. I do think Kulling has sufficiently conveyed that Tesla was ahead of his peers (and general knowledge, of course) in many ways.

While adults who have read a Tesla biography will probably feel it's a bit light on invention content, we have to remember the target audience (and people tend to forget that picture books remain good and valuable for quite a long while after a child learns to read). I wanted to try this one out on my niece and nephew before I reviewed it, but that was taking too long to happen. ( )

Zap! Nikola Tesla Takes Charge is the latest in the Great Ideas Series. Nikola Tesla, sometime rival and sometime partner to Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse was a Croatian (some books describe him as Serbian) credited with (among other things) the creation of alternating electric current. Zap! simplifies the life of this complicated genius and focuses on the public opinion war between AC and DC current.

It's a good start to inspire interest in the intricate political and financial machinations and manipulations that accompanied the electrification of the United States.

A slim amount of source material (in very fine print) is included as "front matter" under the heading, "Sources of Inspiration." ( )