BOOK REVIEW: City Atlas – Travel the World With 30 Maps by Martin Haake & Georgia Cherry

BOOK REVIEW: City Atlas – Travel the World With 30 Maps by Martin Haake & Georgia Cherry

Allen & Unwin
September 2015
Hardback, $35.00
Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar

Picture Book

7/10

My main stumbling block with this large-scale hard cover book is that the title seems to be a bit of a misnomer. Despite the double paged spreads covering 30 of the world’s greatest cities are lovingly rendered by illustrator Martin Haake and writer Georgia Cherry, and jam-packed with interesting and exciting activities and sights to indulge in in each location, they are decidedly not presented as maps, except in the broadest, most abstract sense.

I suppose that won’t matter so much to a child, and there is undoubtedly a lot to like about CITY ATLAS. For starters each cities activities and sights are designed to get kids excited at the prospect of travel – which is never a bad thing.

Similarly, the mixture of things in each city is widely varied: Paris, for instance, goes from the Eiffel Tower and under-city catacombs, through to taking a bike ride and sampling a baguette, exploring city parks and woods, or visiting the Museum of Magic.

On this level it works wonderfully and is guaranteed to whet kids’ appetites to travel and explore the wondrous world we live in. Cities featured include Lisbon, Barcelona, London, Amsterdam, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Helsinki, Oslo, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Athens, Istanbul, Prague, Budapest, Moscow, Montreal, Toronto, Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Cape Town, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Seoul, Mumbai and Sydney.

Category: Book Reviews