CAPTAIN FLINN AND THE PIRATE DINOSAURS

The creators of Captain Flinn and the Pirate Dinosaurs (2005) again chuck lots of promising elements together—evidently in hopes that they’ll assemble themselves into an exciting, or at least coherent, yarn. They don’t. Shortly after pausing in awe before the huge skeleton of a Giganotosaurus on a class trip to the museum, Flinn and friends fall through a wardrobe—er, closet and find themselves aboard a ship heading for Bag O’ Bones Island, where they fight scaly pirates to recover a treasure stolen from the aforementioned museum. Enter Giganotosaurus at the climax, as a towering pirate who hardly gets to roar before he’s reduced to jelly by the sight of a tiny spider. Ayto illustrates the sketchy plot with frenzied cartoon collages featuring lots of big teeth, jumbled action and a ship that looks like a fugitive from a Monty Python animation. Young readers will give this a perfunctory once-over at best; set them instead on a course for the more seaworthy likes of Deb Lund’s Dinosailors (2003), illustrated by Howard Fine. (Picture book. 6-8)