Animals with fake eye spots, glowing lures, putrid flesh, and stinky glands will fascinate kids who love weird and wonderful...
Many animals have creative and often startling ways of changing appearance, whether for attracting a mate, fending off predators, or luring prey.
Jenkins and Page write that “visual display—flashing a bright color, performing a dance, glowing in the dark, even blowing up like a balloon—is the most common way an animal says, ‘Look at me!’ ” Jenkins’ trademark vividly colored, collaged illustrations stand out strongly on white backgrounds, showing a large diversity of animals and birds in threatening or mating display, grouping them together by type of display. Children will be fascinated by their ingenuity: There’s the male hooded seal that inflates a red nasal sack; the magnificent frigatebird, which puffs up a bright red pouch on his throat to attract females; and the pufferfish and common toad, which both inflate their whole bodies to scare off predators. The bright colors of both a range of sea slugs, most poisonous, and poison dart frogs warn their enemies. Some of these animals are straight out of a horror movie, such as the sarcastic fringehead fish, which bares terrifying rows of teeth, and the mandrill, with its lurid grimace of rage. Concise descriptions on each page introduce the animals, and a glossary gives more detailed information about each species.
Animals with fake eye spots, glowing lures, putrid flesh, and stinky glands will fascinate kids who love weird and wonderful science. (Informational picture book. 6-12)Pub Date: June 19, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-544-93553-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2018
A variety show brimming with esoteric and practical information.
Two youngsters embark on a journey peppered with history, trivia, and skits while teaching money lessons.
Meet Mellody and John, the young stars of this currency showcase. Their very first dialogue offers a taste of the intriguing information to come, from the ancient Mayans’ use of cacao beans as payment to the origins of the piggy bank. The book offers a chronologically and geographically broad timeline of the history of money, encompassing the past 3.9 billion years (starting with meteorite crashes that scattered metals—“the very first bank deposit”) and referencing practices across five continents. Readers will find themselves eagerly sharing the facts gleaned here, including the centuries-old origins of terms and expressions still used today. Mellody and John’s fun banter crucially reflects their experiences with money, such as their families’ differing attitudes toward allowances. Both are savers as well as givers, sharing stories about giving to charity. In one especially entertaining section, a cat and a bunny converse in money-related catchphrases that are separately defined at the bottom of each page. Stevens’ watercolors are appropriately realistic and appealing, whether depicting Mellody’s pretend bank or Elizabeth II’s butler ironing a 10-pound note. Messages about money’s use as a means to an end, rather than an end in itself, ensure that readers will think about their own purposes for their savings. Mellody and John are Black.
A variety show brimming with esoteric and practical information. (index) (Nonfiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2024
ISBN: 9781536224719
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
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
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