In this picture drama an Acrocanthosaurus, relative of the mighty T. rex dinosaur, hatches and begins the struggle for survival learning to hunt, hide, eat, or be eaten. The author-artist based her story on a few fossil footprints found in a Texas riverbed showing the tracks of the meat-eating Acrocanthosaurus and the larger, plant-eating Pleurocoelus. Dinosaur behavior is rather tenuously extrapolated from related dinosaurs, as fossil evidence of this huge predator is scarce. The brief text is superimposed on double-page panoramic paintings of the dinosaurs in their natural habitat. The digital images, the author explains, were painted in oil and watercolor using Corel Painter 6. Young viewers may find them too realistic, especially the spread of Pleurocoelus in death throes, bleeding from many wounds, but they are quite remarkable. The intriguing perspectives add drama and immediacy, and the author pushes the limits of the digital media providing impressive detail, for example, the play of light on the mottled textured skin of the giants. This will be a crowd pleaser. (Nonfiction. 7-10)
