What Defines a “Country”?
This book was reviewed as part of Amazon's Vine program which included a free copy of the book.
Superficially, THE LONELY PLANET KIDS TRAVEL BOOK offers a fun, graphic-intensive and trivia-laden presentation of “every country in the world”. Unfortunately, this nicely packaged resource is marred by editors who took it upon themselves to interpret what is and isn’t a country. While the book definitely has redeeming qualities, it contains selective and misleading information.
WHAT I LIKED ABOUT THIS BOOK:
- A single fact-filled page designated to each region/country that is chock full of interesting bits of information. Each page includes a “fact card” that offers basic information: a general synopsis, a drawing of the country and flag, population and area data (with their rank in the world). Oddly, the average life expectancy (and its world rank) is also included.
- Each page has several photos and drawings that illustrate identifiable, lesser-known and even obscure aspects of each place being depicted. Every graphic is accompanied with a brief, but informative textual explanation. I found the presentation quite appealing and like the succinctness the page-per-place format offers. The factoids are certainly interesting in that they are varied and unique (food, traditions, structures, native animals, global contributions, etc.)
WHAT BOTHERS ME:
- The places are grouped by continent. Within each continent, the places appear to be organized in a geographical nature instead of alphabetically. This makes it more difficult to quickly reference a specific place without looking it up in the index.
- The biggest issue I have is that the editors personally decided what was and wasn’t a country. Tibet is a region of China, like it or not. Hong Kong is a special administrative region. People may want Palestine to be recognized as country, but, as of now, it isn’t. The inhabitants of the United Kingdom may not be happily “united”, but Northern Ireland, Wales, England and Scotland are not countries. Other questionable “countries” include Kosovo and Taiwan. For true educational purposes, the editors could have/should have included an additional chapter that explained the reality of disputed and/or autonomous regions. Instead of being up-front and accurate, the editors opt to for a feel-good approach and simply present the world in the manner they believe it should be (try bypassing Chinese authority when travelling to Tibet). Considering what regions are labeled as countries, I’m surprised Greenland gets the “cold-shoulder”.
This book’s potential is tainted by politics and that’s a shame, because it could be great. It calls itself a travel book, but comes across more like a selective encyclopedic resource. Maybe the editors could have used PLACE instead of the word “country” in the book’s title … and drop the beef with Greenland … you can travel there too.