Here is a fascinating, detailed look at the life of Charles Darwin: naturalist, geologist, and independent thinker. In his author's note, Caldecott Honor illustrator Peter Sis (Starry Messenger, Tibet: Through the Red Box) writes that Darwin always regretted not learning how to draw. However, he could and did take "dense and vivid" written notes, from which Sis drew his inspiration. Readers will spend hours poring over the gorgeous, intricately crafted pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations depicting layer upon layer of Darwin’s life as he developed his theories about the origins of life and natural selection. Tidbits from Darwin’s extensive and legendary voyage on the Beagle, notes on Galapagos tortoises, bloodsucking benchuca bugs, and Toxodon skeletons, and particulars from his family life intermingle with each other--just as in real life. Crammed with a veritable muddle of diary entries, cameo portraits, diagrams, natural illustrations, maps, timelines, a gatefold spread, and narrative divided into "Public Life," "Private Life," and "Secret Life" blocks of text, The Tree of Life will certainly be overwhelming to some readers; for other, less linear thinkers, it will be sheer, chaotic delight. (Ages 9 and older) --Emilie Coulter


From School Library Journal
Grade 4 Up-Sis offers an impressive homage to the life and ideas of Darwin through a fully illustrated, multilayered narrative augmented with copious charts, maps, and sketches. Two strands of text recounting Darwin's youth from his own and his father's points of view run below picture blocks in several early pages. Soon smaller chunks of text, often taken from Darwin's journals, move across the spreads with a central image and copious small, framed vignettes and picture bits. Other pages are filled completely with rows of picture cards. The artist melds information into handsome constructions to explain first the long years of travel aboard the Beagle and then the naturalist's evolving ideas about the origin of species. He knew all along it was a troublesome notion, and Sis introduces many other scientists and thinkers who influenced his work or objected to it. A gatefold spread near the end of the book reproduces the title page of the famous book, here with swirling lines of explanation and illustration. Muted tones of blue, green, and tan, and finely hatched drawings in the manner of old prints lend a period look to the pages. Beautifully conceived and executed, the presentation is a humorous and informative tour de force that will absorb and challenge readers. Though linear in its chronology, the sweeping, circular design and shorthand catalog of species, people, and ideas encountered by Darwin is a fragmentary account. However, it's a fabulous, visually exciting introduction to the man, his ideas, and the science of the natural world.Margaret Bush, Simmons College, BostonCopyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Gr. 4-7. Sis incorporates phrases, lines, and paragraphs of text into the artwork of this highly visual biography of Charles Darwin. Cameos, small portraits, and miniature framed drawings add further layers of texture and information. The narrative follows Darwin through his youth as he struggled to find his life's work, and through his adult years of scientific study, observation, and thinking that led to the publication of The Origin of Species and other writings. At the heart of the book is Darwin's work as a naturalist aboard the Beagle, when he collected the specimens and made the observations that formed the basis of his theories. Giving young readers a sense of Darwin's curiosity, adventures, and discoveries are a series of small journal pages featuring exquisite illustrations and tiny seemingly hand-lettered type that nearly discourages reading. A number of mysterious and evocative pictures fill the endpapers, with pictures suggesting biblical and other creation stories in the front and images representing the scientific study of the natural world in the back. A sophisticated interpretation that will have rapt admirers, including many adults. Carolyn Phelan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Review
"Sweeping in scope, lavish in detail, this is a book to launch many a reader's personal voyage of discovery." --Starred, Publishers Weekly

"Beautifully conceived and executed, the presentation is a humorous and informative tour de force that will absorb and challenge readers...a fabulous, visually exciting introduction to the man, his ideas and the science of the natural world." --Starred, School Library Journal

"Sís translates Darwin's written legacy into visual narrative in an extraordinary book that explores Darwin's life, work, and sources of inspiration...The detailed illustrations and narrative complexities demand of readers the same process Darwin set for himself: observe carefully, make connections, and learn." --Starred, The Horn Book

"Sís incorporates phrases, lines, and paragraphs of text into the artwork of this highly visual biography of Charles Darwin...A sophisticated interpretation that will have rapt admirers, including many adults." --Booklist

"This enchanting find is for readers of all ages." --VOYA



Review
"Sweeping in scope, lavish in detail, this is a book to launch many a reader's personal voyage of discovery." --Starred, Publishers Weekly

"Beautifully conceived and executed, the presentation is a humorous and informative tour de force that will absorb and challenge readers...a fabulous, visually exciting introduction to the man, his ideas and the science of the natural world." --Starred, School Library Journal

"Sís translates Darwin's written legacy into visual narrative in an extraordinary book that explores Darwin's life, work, and sources of inspiration...The detailed illustrations and narrative complexities demand of readers the same process Darwin set for himself: observe carefully, make connections, and learn." --Starred, The Horn Book

"Sís incorporates phrases, lines, and paragraphs of text into the artwork of this highly visual biography of Charles Darwin...A sophisticated interpretation that will have rapt admirers, including many adults." --Booklist

"This enchanting find is for readers of all ages." --VOYA



Book Description
In this brilliant presentation of a revolutionary thinker's life, the picture book becomes an art form

As far as I can judge, I am not apt to follow blindly the lead of other men . . .

Charles Darwin was, above all else, an independent thinker who continues even now to influence the way we look at the natural world. His endless curiosity and passion for detail resulted in a wealth of notebooks, diaries, correspondence, and published writings that Peter Sís transforms into a visual treasure trove. A multilayered journey through Darwin’s world, The Tree of Life begins with his childhood and traces the arc of his life through university and career, following him around the globe on the voyage of the Beagle, and home to a quiet but momentous life devoted to science and family. Sís uses his own singular vision to create a gloriously detailed panorama of a genius’s trajectory through investigating and understanding the mysteries of nature. In pictures executed in fine pen and ink and lush watercolors – cameo portraits, illustrated pages of diary, cutaway views of the Beagle, as well as charts, maps, and a gatefold spread – Peter Sís has shaped a wondrous introduction to Charles Darwin.



Card catalog description
Presents the life of the famous nineteenth-century naturalist using text from Darwin's writings and detailed drawings by Sis.


About the Author
Peter Sís has written and illustrated many award-winning books for children, including Starry Messenger: Galileo Galilei and Tibet Through the Red Box, both Caldecott Honor books. He lives in New York with his wife and two children.

FROM OUR EDITORS

The Barnes & Noble Review
Renowned children's author Peter Sís re-creates with equal brilliance the style and substance of his Caldecott Honor–winning Starry Messenger: Galileo Galilei, this time showing audiences the theoretical accomplishments of the legendary naturalist Charles Darwin. From the scientist's birth in Shrewsbury, England, to his buriel in Westminster Abbey, Sís covers all the bases and delves even deeper, combining sophisticated illustrations of Darwin's life, journal entries, and letters with straightforward text that contrasts Darwin's private investigations with his public persona. Particularly impressive are the intricate and dramatic details that Sís puts into his artwork, such as a depiction of the HMS Beagle that -- on one spread -- includes aerial and side views of the ship and its interior, small scenes of the Beagle in several locations, mini portraits of Captain Robert Fitzroy and Darwin, and short diary entries about Darwin's experiences on the ship. Other breathtaking spreads illustrate portions of the naturalist's journal entries from his time in South America (dividing the spread into 32 smaller pages); a map entitled "The Voyage of the Beagle: December 27, 1831–October 2, 1836"; and, daringly, images that meld the theorist's body with those of the animals around him. But the book's climax coincides with the corresponding high point of Darwin's work -- The Origin of Species -- as a dynamic fold-out spread jubilantly encompasses various fauna, Darwin's theory of evolution, the past, the present, and even the earth itself. At the end, readers will sit agog at Sís' treatment, which is no small feat given the scope of what Darwin achieved in his lifetime. Each page is a mini masterpiece in itself, focusing on the minutiae just as Darwin did, and always awash in history with its watery hues and faint recollection of di Vinci's drawings. Pure Sís through and through, however, this tribute is a history lesson that without fail transcends the norm as it enchants and enlightens. Matt Warner

ANNOTATION

Presents the life of the famous nineteenth-century naturalist using text from Darwin's writings and detailed drawings by Sis.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

As far as I can judge, I am not apt to follow blindly the lead of other men . . .

Charles Darwin was, above all else, an independent thinker who continues even now to influence the way we look at the natural world. His endless curiosity and passion for detail resulted in a wealth of notebooks, diaries, correspondence, and published writings that Peter Sís transforms into a visual treasure trove. A multilayered journey through Darwin's world, The Tree of Life begins with his childhood and traces the arc of his life through university and career, following him around the globe on the voyage of the Beagle, and home to a quiet but momentous life devoted to science and family. Sís uses his own singular vision to create a gloriously detailed panorama of a genius's trajectory through investigating and understanding the mysteries of nature. In pictures executed in fine pen and ink and lush watercolors - cameo portraits, illustrated pages of diary, cutaway views of the Beagle, as well as charts, maps, and a gatefold spread - Peter Sís has shaped a wondrous introduction to Charles Darwin.

FROM THE CRITICS

The New York Times

S￯﾿ﾽs' book The Tree of Life succeeds brilliantly in arresting and educating the eye. Using a very limited but appealing range of hues, tones and geometric shapes, S￯﾿ﾽs, who won a MacArthur Foundation ''genius award'' last month, invites calm and slow movement through his text. His challenge is to translate Darwin's notebooks -- the journeyman documents that substantiated his grand theory -- into pictures. — Daria Donnelly

The Washington Post

The text is based on Darwin's own writings, and the drawings are Sís's fantastically detailed visual interpretation of them. Fascinating material...—Elizabeth Ward

Publishers Weekly

In another stunning picture book biography, Sis (Starry Messenger) trains his attention on Charles Darwin. From the naturalist's early days ("Charles doesn't like... school") to his father's initial refusal to let him sail aboard the H.M.S. Beagle to the explosive reaction to his theory of natural selection, Sis traces the arc of the scientific giant's life. The sheer amount of information he compiles and presents-all with great fluidity and ingenuity-is nothing short of staggering. Not an inch of space goes unused (including the endpapers, which extend the major themes of Darwin's career through a patchwork of elaborate motifs), and the result is an opulent and vastly absorbing tapestry of maps, thumbnail portraits, diary entries, floor plans, family trees and more, including an elaborate gatefold that illuminates Darwin's major work, On the Origin of Species. Sis's trademark style, with its meticulous cross-hatching, pointillistic images and slightly enigmatic air, invites close inspection and repeat readings. His knack for defining not only the grand events of a subject's life, but also the humanizing particulars once again make a complex subject accessible to readers-Darwin's daily domestic schedule, for instance ("12:00 noon: Rain or shine, stroll around the Sandwalk with Polly, his dog") and his childhood nickname ("Gas"). Sweeping in scope, lavish in detail, this is a book to launch many a reader's personal voyage of discovery. Ages 8-up. (Oct.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Children's Literature - Phyllis Kennemer, Ph.D.

Although Darwin did not originate the theory of evolution, his scholarly research and the subsequent publication of his book in 1859 secured his place in history as the first and foremost authority on the subject. This biography presents a comprehensive view of Darwin's life with historical entries, facts about his public life, and personal information taken from his diaries. Darwin regretted that he could not draw, but he made up for this perceived deficiency by writing very detailed descriptions of all that he observed. Sis has used these documents to illustrate a plethora of details within the picture book format. Not only has he drawn pictures for the specimens Darwin described, he has also profusely illustrated events from throughout Darwin's life, including his birth, childhood, education, family, and professional accomplishments. Darwin was attracted to the study of natural phenomena from an early age and was invited to travel on the H.M.S. Beagle to study the south of America as a naturalist when he was 22. This five-year voyage was the most significant event of his life and charted his future career choices. Both children and adults will find this many layered account of Darwin's life fascinating. 2003, Frances Foster Books/Farrar Straus Giroux, Ages 8 up.

School Library Journal