I MET A DINOSAUR

A young girl's visit to the natural-history museum is intended to be an invitation to imagining dinosaurs everywhere— in the park, at the gas station, behind the shed, on the lake. What begins with intrigue and the promise of adventure rapidly bogs down in humdrum poetry panels paired with mismatched illustrations. The musings in the girl's mind do not always translate visually into specific types of dinosaurs. For example, it's hard to see how two electric towers become a triceratops or how a moose could be mistaken for a brontosaurus (now known as Apatosaurus). The illustrations stand alone, enticing and atmospheric on their own, but too often fail to bring readers into a visual understanding of the metamorphosis mentioned in the abstract text. Exceptions to this are the scales of a stegosaurus that form the sign for the gas station and the lumbering shape of a diplodocus that mimics treetops and rooftops in the fog. A good-looking design includes a clean layout and thoughtful composition, but the book in general does not sustain the creativity evidenced in its first and final panels. (Picture book. 4-7)