Editors of Kingfisher

Though this is a well-made and chock-full-o'-facts little brick of a book, the word "Geography" in the title is very misleading. The text has more to do with a region's geopolitics and history than with physical geography. And many of the photos are of things like the inside of a house of worship or an ancient man-made relic. In typical leftist fashion, America is excoriated for its brief (~240 years) experiment with slavery while other more melanin-rich countries receive a pass for thousands of years of slavery. And the final sentence about Russia ominously states that its quality of life is decreasing. (Translation: It's becoming more of a capitalist, Western-style country.) Overall, a bit of a failed effort, albeit fun to flip through for capsule summaries of the world's nations if you know how to filter out bias.… (meer)