Chris Rock

Marty Gitlin's Chris Rock belongs to Enslow Publishing's African-American Icons series, which puts it in the company of biographies of Beyoncé, Jay-Z, and Tyler Perry — all designed for middle and high school library shelves. At 104 pages it moves efficiently through Rock's trajectory from a tough Brooklyn childhood and a segregated elementary school through Saturday Night Live and his emergence as one of the most significant stand-up voices of his generation. The book handles Rock's famously sharp material on race and politics by modifying the strongest language, which makes it more appropriate for school use without sanitizing the substance. Parents and librarians should still be aware that Rock's work covers adult social topics even when softened, and the coverage is necessarily surface-level at this length. As a school library biography that introduces comedy as social commentary, it earns its place on the shelf.