Google It!: How Two Students' Mission to Organize the Internet Changed the World by Anna Redding
Published by Feiwel & Friends on August 14th 2018
ISBN: 1250148227
Pages: 272
Goodreads

This book reads like a long love letter to Google. This is both problematic and interesting. One problem comes right at the start with the exaggeration of how “difficult” it was to find information before Google’s became ever-present in our lives. Readers may leave with the impression that it must have been near to impossible to find your way to a set of encyclopedias or a library to find what you needed to know. Admittedly, Google has changed our world and there is much to learn in the book about how they did it. Anna Crowley Redding research is thorough and most readers will learn something new about Google from this book. Redding is an award-winning journalist and her writing is well-paced and absorbing; students would want to read this independently as well as a source for research. However, it is concerning that Redding does not fully explore the complications that Google has faced (i.e., privacy concerns with Google Glass) in this history of the company and its founders. Even with the problems, this is a solid purchase for libraries and it might just remind students that information can be learned by reading a book and not just online. Source notes and a bibliography are included.

Recommended for grades 6 and up

Elizabeth Andersen, Librarian, Westbrook High School