Description

Mary Kingsley spent her childhood in a small house on a lonely lane outside London, England. Her mother was bedridden, her father rarely home, and Mary served as housekeeper, handyman, nursemaid, and servant. Not until she was thirty years old did Mary get her chance to explore the world she’d read about in her father’s library. In 1893, she arrived in West Africa, where she encountered giant Xying insects, crocodiles, hippos, and brutal heat. Mary endured the hardships of the equatorial country—and thrived.

About the Author

Don Brown is the YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction and Sibert Honor–winning author and illustrator of many nonfiction graphic novels for teens and picture book biographies. He has been widely praised for his resonant storytelling and his delicate watercolor paintings that evoke the excitement, humor, pain, and joy of lives lived with passion. School Library Journal has called him “a current pacesetter who has put the finishing touches on the standards for storyographies.” He lives in New York with his family.

booksbybrown.com

Instagram: @donsart

Praise For…

"A grand introduction to the woman and an inspiring story about perseverance, this is an uncommonly good book about an uncommon traveler." —Booklist, starred review (7/00) Booklist, ALA, Starred Review

"Brown brings each detail to life through vivid imagery." —The Bulletin, starred review (7–8/00) The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, Starred

"Readers will welcome Brown’s unflappable Mary Kingsley to the growing number of picture books about newly-recognized female explorers." —Horn Book, starred review (Sept/Oct 2000) Horn Book, Starred

"Brown manages to get a lot into a few graceful vignettes, and he does the same with his watercolors, using a blue-green and gold-brown palette to evoke London and jungle, desert and heat." —Kirkus Reviews (6/15/00) Kirkus Reviews

"Mary emerges as an intrepid and admirable character." —Publishers Weekly (8/21/00) Publishers Weekly —