An attractive, detailed exploration for an uncertain audience.
The human body gets a visually appealing tour.
Each section of this colorful exploration of human anatomy and physiology begins with a simple question: “How do you move?” and “How do muscles work?” are typical. Detailed, numbered steps are arranged around the large pages, often connected by fine, blue directional lines. Each double-page spread—four augmented with double gatefolds—describes a body system, organ, or process, all of them represented as factory scenes with myriad little workers of various races scampering around fixing, building, or operating fancifully depicted juvenile bodies. The pages are very busy and amusing to pore over. The narrative tends toward complexity, with a challenging vocabulary and granular level of detail. For example, the lateral genticulate nucleus and superior colliculus are both named and explained. Yet on another page urine is described as “pee.” Although sometimes simplistic, the narrative is nearly always accurate, with the exception of one statement that there are valves at the bottom of the heart’s ventricles (although they are depicted correctly in an illustration and described correctly in a different paragraph on the same page). Like David Macaulay’s The Way We Work (2008), this body tour has illustrations that will charm a younger audience than would enjoy the complexity of the written information. For that younger group, Tanya Lloyd Kyi and Ross Kinnaird’s 50 Body Questions (2014) offers a more balanced presentation.
An attractive, detailed exploration for an uncertain audience. (Nonfiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-77085-981-4
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Firefly
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
Hot on the heels of the well-received Leonardo da Vinci (2005) comes another agreeably chatty entry in the Giants of Science series. Here the pioneering physicist is revealed as undeniably brilliant, but also cantankerous, mean-spirited, paranoid and possibly depressive. Newton’s youth and annus mirabilis receive respectful treatment, the solitude enforced by family estrangement and then the plague seen as critical to the development of his thoughtful, methodical approach. His subsequent squabbles with the rest of the scientific community—he refrained from publishing one treatise until his rival was dead—further support the image of Newton as a scientific lone wolf. Krull’s colloquial treatment sketches Newton’s advances in clearly understandable terms without bogging the text down with detailed explanations. A final chapter on “His Impact” places him squarely in the pantheon of great thinkers, arguing that both his insistence on the scientific method and his theories of physics have informed all subsequent scientific thought. A bibliography, web site and index round out the volume; the lack of detail on the use of sources is regrettable in an otherwise solid offering for middle-grade students. (Biography. 10-14)
Pub Date: April 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-670-05921-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2006
This glossy, colorful title in the “I Want To Be” series has visual appeal but poor organization and a fuzzy focus, which limits its usefulness. Each double-paged layout introduces a new topic with six to eight full-color photographs and a single column of text. Topics include types of environmentalists, eco-issues, waste renewal, education, High School of Environmental Studies, environmental vocabulary, history of environmentalism, famous environmentalists, and the return of the eagle. Often the photographs have little to do with the text or are marginal to the topic. For example, a typical layout called “Some Alternative Solutions” has five snapshots superimposed on a double-page photograph of a California wind farm. The text discusses ways to develop alternative forms of energy and “encourage environmentally friendly lifestyles.” Photos include “a healer who treats a patient with alternative therapy using sound and massage,” and “the Castle,” a house built of “used tires and aluminum cans.” Elsewhere, “Did You Know . . . ” shows a dramatic photo of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, but the text provides odd facts such as “ . . . that in Saudi Arabia there are solar-powered pay phones in the desert?” Some sections seem stuck in, a two-page piece on the effects of “El Niño” or 50 postage-stamp–sized photos of endangered species. The author concludes with places to write for more information and a list of photo credits. Pretty, but little here to warrant purchase. (Nonfiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-15-201862-X
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2000
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