ABOUT ARACHNIDS

The Sills continue their tour (About Fish, not reviewed, etc.) through the animal kingdom, introducing 16 spiders, mites, scorpions and other arachnids with full-page portraits, captioned by one-lined general observations: “Most arachnids are predators, hunting for and eating smaller animals.” The presentation is somewhat uneven; though most of the paintings are meticulously exact close-ups. Both the Eastern Wood Ticks on a rabbit’s ear and the young Garden Spiders launching themselves into the air on strands of silk are too tiny to make out useful details, and the follow-up notes at the end gather fascinating facts but do not consistently specify size, range, or, sometimes, even diet for the chosen examples. Still, the scenes of a (harmless) Daring Jumping Spider perched atop a bottle cap, or the (far from harmless) Brown Recluse lurking in an empty shoe, along with an array of fearsome-looking scorpions, should give casual browsers a delighted shiver or two. And young readers in general will benefit from the reminder (or news) that spiders have such a variety of close relatives. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)