Books published by publisher Mikaya Press

The Roman Colosseum was the work of a brilliant and energetic civilization. The Roman Colosseum was the work of a cruel and brutal civilization. Both are true. The Roman Colosseum was one of the most extraordinary buildings in the ancient world, a work of engineering genius whose design is imitated every time a modern stadium is built. Yet, what went on inside this building is difficult to comprehend. Over the centuries, tens of thousands of slaves, prisoners of war, and criminals were slaughtered in the Colosseum for the entertainment of over 50,000 cheering fans. So many animals were destroyed in gruesome "hunts" staged in the arena that entire species disappeared from the Roman colonies of North Africa. The Roman Colosseum interweaves the impressive story of the construction of this remarkable building and the sobering tale of the "games" that went on inside it. In doing so, it reveals an entire civilization in all its genius and its brutality. Wonders of the World series The winner of numerous awards, this series is renowned for Elizabeth Mann's ability to convey adventure and excitement while revealing technical information in engaging and easily understood language. The illustrations are lavishly realistic and accurate in detail but do not ignore the human element. Outstanding in the genre, these books are sure to bring even the most indifferent young reader into the worlds of history, geography, and architecture. "One of the ten best non-fiction series for young readers." - Booklist

It was there. Henry Hudson was certain of it. Beyond the impenetrable fog and crushing ice of the North Atlantic lay the dream of kings, merchants and learned geographers - a passage to the Orient. Sailing small wooden boats well above the arctic circle, guided by maps and charts that were based on rumor and hope as much as fact, surrounded by crews that shared neither his belief nor his commitment, Henry Hudson searched again and again for what was not there. In 1611, his mutinous crew set him adrift on the freezing waters of the bay that would one day bear his name. Beyond the Sea of Ice is the story of Henry Hudson's four harrowing voyages of discovery. Bringing the skills of an experienced novelist to her first non-fiction book, author Joan Elizabeth Goodman creates an epic narrative of Henry Hudson's passionate quest. Fernando Rangel's paintings capture the icy beauty of the North Atlantic, the lushness of the new world and the cruelty and death that accompanied a voyage of discovery. Actual entries from the journals of each voyage bring the reader directly into life at sea in the 17th century.

Albert lived on a small Caribbean Island called Little Scrub. His best friend had just moved away to Brooklyn, New York and Albert was lonely. He was also short, so short that on the first day of Middle School older kids made up a stupid chant about him: “ Little Man, Little Man, you so small. We didn’t hardly see you at all.” Middle School started out bad, and it got worse. Albert grew quieter and sadder. Then he met Peachy, the leader of a troupe of Mocko Jumbies – stiltwalkers. Stiltwalking was a Caribbean tradition, but Peachy’s Mocko Jumbies did a lot more than walk. They danced and leaped on spindly wooden stilts, arms waving, brilliant costumes shimmering. Albert had never seen anything so amazing. Or so dangerous. Peachy offered to teach him to stiltwalk, but Albert was scared of heights. At the same time he could imagine himself up there, walking tall, high above the ground, high above his problems. He decided he had to try it, but he never imagined how hard it would be.

Was there ever a people like the Inkas? Using slingshots, clubs and stone-tipped spears, this small Andean tribe conquered an area spanning 2,500 miles. Without the use of the wheel, they built a vast and sophisticated network of roads. Without an alphabet, they administered a population of ten million people. With the most primitive of tools, they built cities of stone. Machu Picchu is as astonishing as its builders. Set in a remote, inaccessible area of the high Andes, this breathtaking city was never found by the Spanish Conquistadores. It is an untouched example of the genius of the Inkas. Machu Picchu tells the story about the rise of the Inkas and the building of this great city. Award-winning author Elizabeth Mann has become justly famous for engrossing narratives that make distant worlds comprehensible and complex engineering feats accessible. In Machu Picchu, these talents are displayed to their fullest. Amy Crehore's paintings convey a fabulous world that seems at once intensely real and dream-like. Her luminous pallette is an Inka tapestry unfaded by time. Wonders of the World series The winner of numerous awards, this series is renowned for Elizabeth Mann's ability to convey adventure and excitement while revealing technical information in engaging and easily understood language. The illustrations are lavishly realistic and accurate in detail but do not ignore the human element. Outstanding in the genre, these books are sure to bring even the most indifferent young reader into the worlds of history, geography, and architecture. "One of the ten best non-fiction series for young readers." - Booklist

Imagine a wall 30 feet high, a wall thousands of miles long, a wall that crossed deserts and climbed over impossibly jagged peaks, a wall that contained thousands of individual forts and towers, a wall that was guarded by over a million soldiers, a wall that took 200 years to build. Now imagine the enemy that this wall was built to defend against. The Mongols were nomadic warriors of legendary skill and savagery. Their empire encompassed most of the known world, from southern Asia to northern Europe, from the Middle East to the Sea of Japan. Now the fierce and unstoppable horsemen were bearing down on China. For the Chinese, there seemed only one solution: to turn their country into a vast fortress. The Great Wall chronicles a people's struggle for absolute security in a violent and dangerous world. It is a story of astonishing success and ultimate failure, of ingenuity, determination, the will to survive and, in the end, futility. Wonders of the World series The winner of numerous awards, this series is renowned for Elizabeth Mann's ability to convey adventure and excitement while revealing technical information in engaging and easily understood language. The illustrations are lavishly realistic and accurate in detail but do not ignore the human element. Outstanding in the genre, these books are sure to bring even the most indifferent young reader into the worlds of history, geography, and architecture. "One of the ten best non-fiction series for young readers." - Booklist

Ruth Jacobsen spent her first childhood in Germany. It ended one night when she was six years old and hiding in terror as she watched people being thrown from windows. It was Kristallnacht, the Night of Breaking Glass. Her family fled and found haven in the idyllic Dutch village of Oud Zuylen. There Ruth became a child again. When she was eight, the Germans invaded Holland. When she was nine, her grandmother was put on a train and never seen again. Soon she was wearing a Jewish star on her coat. When she was 10, she was separated from her parents. Frightened and alone, she went from house to house, hiding from the Nazis in the homes of strangers. Ruth Jacobsen's childhood was over forever. For the rest of her life she tried to forget her loss. One day, forty years after the war, she opened an album of family photographs that had lain in a box at the bottom of a closet, untouched. "My fear had always been that I would break down or become hysterical," she writes. Instead, she transformed the images into art, creating a series of vivid collages that pieced together her shattered childhood. As she worked, long suppressed memories came to the surface. She wrote them down. The result is a unique document of a life and a time. Rescued Images combines Ruth's collages and her moving memoir of the wrenching events of a half century ago. Young Ruth Jacobsen is brought back to life on these pages: frightened and bewildered, buffeted by forces she cannot understand or control, bending but never breaking.

A light-hearted tale of a boy who gains self-confidence with the help of some timely mentoring. Albert is short -- very short -- and he hates it. His older brothers are tall like his father, but he takes after his petite mother. He wears too-large hand-me-down clothes from his bigger brothers. And worst of all, his very best friend moved away to Brooklyn during the school break. It was all so unfair. Albert is beginning Middle School on Little Scrub, the small Caribbean Island where he lives. As he steps on the bus, and sees the older kids, he feels smaller than ever. They take one look at him and howl with laughter, chanting "Little Man, Little Man, you so small, didn't hardly see you at all." Things go downhill from there, and would've stayed down if it wasn't for an encounter with Peachy, the leader of a troupe of stiltwalkers. The stiltwalkers do a lot more than walk: they dance and leap across the sand on spindly eight-foot high wooden stilts, their brilliantly colored costumes shimmering in the moonlight. Peachy invites Albert to join the high school students he teaches to stiltwalk. It's not an easy decision for Albert. Would they laugh at him even harder than the Middle School kids? And he is queasy about heights. The thought of wobbling around on those skinny wooden sticks makes him woozy with fear. But Albert is won over by the thought that one day he might actually be up there, tall as a palm tree, dancing around without fear or hesitation. Besides, desperate times call for desperate measures and nobody was more desperate than Albert. Slowly, as his stiltwalking improves, Albert finds his self-confidence grows. He becomes less of a target for teasing at school and he makes some new friends.

Water falls softly In cold snow crystals Onto the mountaintop... So begins Eileen Cameron's poetic rendering of a canyon's creation. Cameron captures millions of years of geology in 38 thrilling lines as she follows the water's journey down from the mountaintop, gaining power and strength with each mile. "Drops that trickle through crannies", become a stream that "cascades through the rocks" and then a river that "crashes through boulders ... digging the river bed, steepening the cliffs." And the canyon is born. Michael Collier's stunning photographs of the creeks, streams, waterfalls, rivers, grottos and canyons of the Colorado evoke the lyrical beauty and raw power of the canyon and the forces that create it. Through their art, Cameron and Collier have conveyed to the young reader a feeling of awe and wonder for one of nature's most spectacular creations.

A light-hearted tale of a boy who gains self-confidence with the help of some timely mentoring. Albert is short -- very short -- and he hates it. His older brothers are tall like his father, but he takes after his petite mother. He wears too-large hand-me-down clothes from his bigger brothers. And worst of all, his very best friend moved away to Brooklyn during the school break. It was all so unfair. Albert is beginning Middle School on Little Scrub, the small Caribbean Island where he lives. As he steps on the bus, and sees the older kids, he feels smaller than ever. They take one look at him and howl with laughter, chanting "Little Man, Little Man, you so small, didn't hardly see you at all." Things go downhill from there, and would've stayed down if it wasn't for an encounter with Peachy, the leader of a troupe of stiltwalkers. The stiltwalkers do a lot more than walk: they dance and leap across the sand on spindly eight-foot high wooden stilts, their brilliantly colored costumes shimmering in the moonlight. Peachy invites Albert to join the high school students he teaches to stiltwalk. It's not an easy decision for Albert. Would they laugh at him even harder than the Middle School kids? And he is queasy about heights. The thought of wobbling around on those skinny wooden sticks makes him woozy with fear. But Albert is won over by the thought that one day he might actually be up there, tall as a palm tree, dancing around without fear or hesitation. Besides, desperate times call for desperate measures and nobody was more desperate than Albert. Slowly, as his stiltwalking improves, Albert finds his self-confidence grows. He becomes less of a target for teasing at school and he makes some new friends.

On July 4, 1997, The Mars Pathfinder lander, cocooned in an ungainly mass of airbags, was dropped from a parachute 40 feet above Mars. It slammed to the surface, kicked up the red Martian dust, bounced along like a giant beach ball and rolled to a stop. Pathfinder's three solar panel "petals" unfolded. Nestled inside was Sojourner, a one foot high, remote control vehicle that looked like something you might find under a Christmas tree. The world had a new hero. The Mars mission was a genuine phenomenon. In a one month period, there were over a half billion hits on the mission's web site, breaking all records by hundreds of millions of hits. The most watched, most talked about space flight since men had landed on the Moon, it was also the most unlikely. In The Adventures of Sojourner, Susi Trautmann Wunsch tells the entire story: from the small team of young scientists testing a simplified, common sense of technology, to the tension of blast off, to the wild bounce landing, to Sojourner's trials and tribulations along the rocky road of Mars, to ultimate and resounding success. It is a page-turning narrative that, along the way, explains the intricacies of planetary exploration to a new generation of young readers. The diagrams and artist's conceptions make space technology instantly accessible. The photographs of little Sojourner tooling along the dusty, red emptiness of Mars make space travel seem not so distant at all.