Review: Sky Boys: How They Built the Empire State Building

Sky Boys: How They Built the Empire State Building by Deborah Hopkinson

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



The information was good, and the illustrations impeccable. I felt like these illustrations were a very good replacement for the photographs we might expect. Hopkinson cites in the sources a good photography collection by Hine, and used on the end sheets. Ransome's illustration style is just right, using just enough impressionism to avoid photorealism but also giving us a clear representational look at the building process. Point of view makes these paintings interesting, allowing for complex and well balanced compositions.

Design by Ed Miller and Rachael Cole looks like it was done either in collaboration with Ransome. I much preferred the pages where the text was integrated into the picture rather than being placed on a cutaway below or to the side of the pictures. I also wondered if more process couldn't have been introduced like the 1-2-3-4 riveting process featured early on.

The narrative of the boy and his pop is in 2nd person, which felt like a strange choice, but it appears the intent was to make me identify with watching the building go up as a citizen and then visiting it after finished to complete the spectator experience. It's almost like Hopkinson couldn't decide whether to do the story of the boy and his pop or the story of the Sky Boys. Since the title is Sky Boys, I wish she had just stayed with the latter and not messed with the narrative.



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