Book Review: I am George Lucas

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My wife came home from a Librarian’s Convention with the observation that publishers have now gone completely overboard on non-fiction books. I suppose that is the case (thanks, Common Core!). It’s not a bad thing to have some solid non-fiction but her impression is that good fiction titles have suffered as a result.

I Am George Lucas is part of that growing non-fiction trend aimed at elementary students. Particularly, boys. The biography (not autobiography, oddly enough, given the title, which is misleading. While Lucas provides a quick opening introduction, the rest of this short book is a standard biographical account of Lucas) is a quick read, aimed at third and fourth graders. There’s not a lot of meat in these bones, so to speak.

But for those interested in the life of the man who envisioned Star Wars and Indiana Jones and a few other classic movies (I’m not sure American Graffiti will ring in the heads of young readers), this book does the trick of hitting the key moments of Lucas’ life, growing up with no real focus until college, when he realized that he wanted to make movies. We see his partnerships with Francis Ford Coppola and Steven Spielberg, and others, that opened doors for Lucas that would otherwise have been shut.

You come away from the book with a sense of not only the vision of Lucas but also the drive and courage to stand up to Hollywood at times (he could have used some more outside voices for editing the most recent batch of Star Wars movies, in my mind, but critical views of his movies are almost nonexistent here). I like that they show how Lucas is using his wealth to push filmmaking forward and his work around philanthropic issues, such as education.

I am George Lucas is not a classic, but it is readable and informative.

Peace (in space),
Kevin

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