Everything You Need to Know About AIDS (Need to Know Library)

Discusses the AIDS disease, its discovery, causes, transmission, treatment, and how to protect oneself from contracting the disease

Grade 6-9 Like others in this series, this book is characterized by an open format, bold headings, dull black-and-white photos, dramatic color photos, short reading lists, address lists, an index, and a glossary (terms are also defined in the text). The diagrams of how viruses work and the usual chapter on plagues through history are no match for those in Hawkes' AIDS (Gloucester, 1987). One paragraph is carelessly printed twice. The text lists basic guidelines for avoiding disease and cautions against believing misconceptions on how it is caught, but with no special compassion for those suffering from the disease, and no mention of the social movement surrounding AIDS. Nothing is new or memorable here. Better choices than this book are Hawke's book, Check's AIDS (Chelsea House, 1988) and Lerner's Understanding AIDS (Lerner, 1987). Anne Osborn, Riverside Public Library, Calif.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.