Fascinating in scope, admirable for clarity: a winner.
Emberley tracks a loving mom’s text message to her child on its secondslong global journey.
The narrative begins with receipt by the sleeping child’s “two little ears.” The message glows on the phone’s glass surface, “radiating out as billions of electromagnetic photons.” Cells in the eyes detect the photons and translate their message as an electrical signal, which travels through hollow nerve cells filled with salty fluid, “straight to the brain.” Italicized science facts augment the narration: Cannily, Emberley analogizes humans’ ability to conduct electricity through nerves and salt with machined infrastructure that does so via copper wire. Emberley uses the child’s return text to further examine the brain’s neural interactivity with the phone, then broadens the overview to unpack the complex, fascinating STEM systems that support modern global communications. Emberley deftly illuminates their basics with clear language, labeled illustrations, and ongoing respect for child readers. Signature, loose-lined pictures often show both under- and aboveground activity. Rabbits scamper in tunnels as kids swing on a playground; underground cabling snakes along, unseen. Details deftly enhance child appeal. Cellphone towers are sometimes disguised as trees to blend in with local landscapes. The locations of undersea cable landings are kept “as secret as possible, to prevent sabotage,” and the cables’ “protective armor” can withstand a shark bite. Child and mother both have pale skin and straight, dark hair. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Fascinating in scope, admirable for clarity: a winner. (author’s note, information resources) (Informational picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5344-5290-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
A gleeful game for budding naturalists.
Artfully cropped animal portraits challenge viewers to guess which end they’re seeing.
In what will be a crowd-pleasing and inevitably raucous guessing game, a series of close-up stock photos invite children to call out one of the titular alternatives. A page turn reveals answers and basic facts about each creature backed up by more of the latter in a closing map and table. Some of the posers, like the tail of an okapi or the nose on a proboscis monkey, are easy enough to guess—but the moist nose on a star-nosed mole really does look like an anus, and the false “eyes” on the hind ends of a Cuyaba dwarf frog and a Promethea moth caterpillar will fool many. Better yet, Lavelle saves a kicker for the finale with a glimpse of a small parasitical pearlfish peeking out of a sea cucumber’s rear so that the answer is actually face and butt. “Animal identification can be tricky!” she concludes, noting that many of the features here function as defenses against attack: “In the animal world, sometimes your butt will save your face and your face just might save your butt!” (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A gleeful game for budding naturalists. (author’s note) (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: July 11, 2023
ISBN: 9781728271170
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks eXplore
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An in-depth and visually pleasing look at one of the most fundamental forces in the universe.
An introduction to gravity.
The book opens with the most iconic demonstration of gravity, an apple falling. Throughout, Herz tackles both huge concepts—how gravity compresses atoms to form stars and how black holes pull all kinds of matter toward them—and more concrete ones: how gravity allows you to jump up and then come back down to the ground. Gravity narrates in spare yet lyrical verse, explaining how it creates planets and compresses atoms and comparing itself to a hug. “My embrace is tight enough that you don’t float like a balloon, but loose enough that you can run and leap and play.” Gravity personifies itself at times: “I am stubborn—the bigger things are, the harder I pull.” Beautiful illustrations depict swirling planets and black holes alongside racially diverse children playing, running, and jumping, all thanks to gravity. Thorough backmatter discusses how Sir Isaac Newton discovered gravity and explains Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. While at times Herz’s explanations may be a bit too technical for some readers, burgeoning scientists will be drawn in.
An in-depth and visually pleasing look at one of the most fundamental forces in the universe. (Informational picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: April 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781668936849
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tilbury House
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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