FORESTS

The Sills add to their About Habitats series with this look at the forests of the world.

Using the same format as the others in the series, Cathryn Sill writes a sentence or two in a large font on left-hand pages, while her husband, John Sill, uses realistic watercolors to illustrate the information presented. “Many animals find food and shelter in forests,” for example, is placed opposite a deciduous forest scene of a black bear, broad-winged hawk, brown creeper, question mark butterfly, red-spotted salamander and box turtle; though none appears to be eating or in any shelter, save the salamander, who is peeking from underneath a leaf, some are camouflaged, which is what the paragraph about this particular illustration plate explains in the afterword. This is where readers will need to turn in order to learn more specific information—a miss for the series, as incorporating this within the text in a text box or smaller font would have broadened the age range of its potential audience. Another miss is the lack of a detailed map in the backmatter, which could have pinpointed some of the locations, going beyond the seven continents portrayed on the map at the front. Still, the Sills do a good job of showing (and especially identifying) both plants and animals.

A solid introduction, though it’s not without its flaws.