True tales of our world's greatest 15th century explorers, from Bartholomew Diaz and Christopher Columbus to Juan Ponce de Leon and Vasco Nunez de Balboa, are fascinatingly portrayed, complimented with the softly shaded pencil illustrations of Anthony Bacon Venti. Readers are led through a one-hundred-year period when Europeans explored the world and mapped the globe, while selfishly feeding their own curiosity and greed along the way. Fritz includes astounding details, which provide young readers with an expanded understanding of events and the idiosyncrasies of these colorful characters. Venti's maps clarify the explorers' routes. Count on Jean Fritz to breathe life into these true tales of the Old World's fifteen most extraordinary explorers. It is history written in a refreshingly new way.

"While presenting the salient facts, Fritz approaches them with playful irreverence; accordingly, the frequently traveled material can seem refreshingly new."--Publisher's Weekly