The story of an invention can be surprisingly convoluted. Pass Go and Collect $200 does a great job of tracing the complicated story of the boardgame Monopoly.

Monopoly arguably started as Landlord’s Game, a game created by Elizabeth Magie to critique capitalism. Tanya Lee Stone deftly describes the social conditions that led Magie to patent the idea in 1904. She traces Magie’s attempts to market the game and shows the ways the game took on a life of its own. We see individuals making their own gameboards and passing the rules one, one to another, until Charles Darrow, tried his hand at it.

Darrow had great graphic design instincts and was the source of many of the iconic graphic elements of Monopoly. He was also the one who eventually sold the game to Parker Brothers, igniting the feud over who was the real inventor of the game.

I was especially impressed by how balanced Stone is in her discussion of both Magie’s and Darrow’s claims. While she’s obviously trying to help people remember an innovative woman’s role in the game, she doesn’t hestiate to give Darrow his due. It’s a great model of how to make an argument without ignoring the opposing viewpoint.

The back matter in the book is really fun, too. There’s a section with Monopoly math questions, Monopoly trivia, a list of sources, and–my favorite–an author’s note. In the author’s note, Stone tells how the idea for the book came from an editor who apologized at the time for it’s not being an idea about a woman. Little did she know that it was an idea about a woman!

The book will be especially popular with kids who love Monopoly, but there’s something in it for everyone.

Pass Go and Collect $200: The Real Story of How Monopoly Was Invented by Tanya Lee Stone, illustrated by Steven Salerno, Christy Ottaviano Books: 2018.

Alyson Beecher hosts the Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge at kidlitfrenzy.com. Visit there for more great nonfiction picture books!