Dramatic and depressing in its broad scope and its concerns.
In its varied ecosystems, Earth’s water world contains an astonishing diversity of life.
This oversized album (14.5 by 21.4 inches when opened), first published in the United Kingdom, contains vivid descriptions of 15 different watery environments, their representative plant and animal inhabitants, and how the pollution of the last 100 years is changing each of those worlds. The writer has chosen a wide variety of aquatic ecosystems from around the globe, 1/3 of them in Europe. These regions include mudflats, wetlands, salt marshes, estuaries, mangrove and kelp forests, coral and oyster reefs, seagrass meadows, open water, deep water, vents and seeps, sea ice, and slow- and fast-moving fresh water. Each is described in two double-page spreads, the first offering a general description and panorama, and the second, portraits and short descriptions of plants, vertebrates, invertebrates, and even algae and bacterial mats that characterize the web of life there. Most of the life-forms described can be found in the panorama. Additional text boxes explain what makes these systems distinctive. “Water is life,” Kaufman explains in an introductory section that defines ways water is measured, such as salinity, density, and acidity. The text is information rich, but much of it is printed in a distressingly small font. Rodrigues’ paintings are noteworthy; her representations of specific species are quite accurate, though occasionally creatures described as white or gray in the text are shown as rosy-orange. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Dramatic and depressing in its broad scope and its concerns. (index, sources) (Nonfiction. 10-16)Pub Date: Sept. 28, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4197-5289-6
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Magic Cat
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
Wordplay and wry wit put extra fun into a trove of fundamental knowledge.
With an amped-up sense of wonder, the Science Guy surveys the natural universe.
Starting from first principles like the scientific method, Nye and his co-author marvel at the “Amazing Machine” that is the human body then go on to talk up animals, plants, evolution, physics and chemistry, the quantum realm, geophysics, and climate change. They next venture out into the solar system and beyond. Along with tallying select aspects and discoveries in each chapter, the authors gather up “Massively Important” central concepts, send shoutouts to underrecognized women scientists like oceanographer Marie Tharp, and slip in directions for homespun experiments and demonstrations. They also challenge readers to ponder still-unsolved scientific posers and intersperse rousing quotes from working scientists about how exciting and wide open their respective fields are. If a few of those fields, like the fungal kingdom, get short shrift (one spare paragraph notwithstanding), readers are urged often enough to go look things up for themselves to kindle a compensatory habit. Aside from posed photos of Nye and a few more of children (mostly presenting as White) doing science-y things, the full-color graphic and photographic images not only reflect the overall “get this!” tone but consistently enrich the flow of facts and reflections. “Our universe is a strange and surprising place,” Nye writes. “Stay curious.” Words to live by.
Wordplay and wry wit put extra fun into a trove of fundamental knowledge. (contributors, art credits, selected bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 11-15)Pub Date: Oct. 27, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4676-5
Page Count: 264
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: Aug. 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
Hot on the heels of the well-received Leonardo da Vinci (2005) comes another agreeably chatty entry in the Giants of Science series. Here the pioneering physicist is revealed as undeniably brilliant, but also cantankerous, mean-spirited, paranoid and possibly depressive. Newton’s youth and annus mirabilis receive respectful treatment, the solitude enforced by family estrangement and then the plague seen as critical to the development of his thoughtful, methodical approach. His subsequent squabbles with the rest of the scientific community—he refrained from publishing one treatise until his rival was dead—further support the image of Newton as a scientific lone wolf. Krull’s colloquial treatment sketches Newton’s advances in clearly understandable terms without bogging the text down with detailed explanations. A final chapter on “His Impact” places him squarely in the pantheon of great thinkers, arguing that both his insistence on the scientific method and his theories of physics have informed all subsequent scientific thought. A bibliography, web site and index round out the volume; the lack of detail on the use of sources is regrettable in an otherwise solid offering for middle-grade students. (Biography. 10-14)
Pub Date: April 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-670-05921-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2006
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