MEGA-PREDATORS OF THE PAST

A rousing roundup of outsized meat eaters for readers who, like the author, find Tyrannosaurus rex and cousin dinos “overexposed and overrated.”

Looking like modern creatures, only much bigger, the extinct predators Stewart selects run from a 28-inch prehistoric scorpion to “railroad car”–sized protoshark Megalodon.A slavering “giant ripper lizard” (Varanus prisca) on the cover sets the tone, and as Gray goes on to depict beaked or toothy horrors chasing or snatching prey, the author makes up for the lack of explicit gore with commentary that suggestively goes for the gusto: “Dive! Swish! Chomp! Gulp! Meet the Sanders seabird—a prehistoric predator guaranteed to make fish fret and squid squirm.” Each sharply detailed portrait comes with a fact box and, entertainingly, a silhouette with a to-scale human figure flinching, cowering, or fleeing in terror. In a closing twist, the final entry, the “biggest predator of all time,” is the nonextinct blue whale (“makes T. rex look like a puny pipsqueak”); for added value, along with a source list and an audience-appropriate selection of further reading, the author and illustrator both end with helpful notes on their research methods. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

A creature feature presented, and likely to be devoured, with relish.