HELLO, BUMBLEBEE BAT

Framed as simply phrased questions and answers in differently sized type, this interview with the world’s smallest bat—at rest, about the size of a quarter, as a life-sized view on the final page attests—will fill in younger naturalists on its looks, diet, enemies (“Bumblebee Bat, what do you fear?” “I am afraid of humans and birds”) and habits. Generally wearing a fixed-looking smile and facing viewers directly, the interviewee flits across twilit, precisely detailed painted scenes, posing next to a bee and a mouse for scale, hunting and chowing down on a moth and then retiring to a sleeping cave with its “brothers and sisters.” Rare enough to be officially endangered, these diminutive creatures get at least a mention in most of the general introductions to bats, but they’re highlighted here with a distinctive charm that’s likely to linger with children. Jill C. Wheeler’s photo-illustrated Bumblebee Bats (2005) is aimed at a slightly older audience. (Picture book/nonfiction. 5-7)