One delectable sampler of wonders, there for the asking.
A worldwide collection of superior oddities.
For each of the 47 countries featured here, Thuras and Mosco highlight two strange features, be they weather or natural resources, human artifact or moment in history. Accompanied by Ang’s full-color illustrations and a small globe situating the country under examination, Thuras and Mosco have linked each country to the next in line by some common curiosity. Peru’s Nazca Lines lead to Australia’s Marree Man, for instance, and then Australia’s second marvel—Lord Howe Island, where dwells the phasmid, a lobsterlike, hand-long insect—leads to Brazil’s Snake Island, which hosts swarms of golden lanceheads (“They sit in trees and ambush migratory birds, injecting flesh-dissolving venom into them”) but very few visitors. It is debatable whether a kid has to be adventurous to enjoy many of these unusual features, such as the Antikythera mechanism, which is akin to a 2,000-year-old computer, found in Greece or England’s difference engine No. 2, a 200-year-old mathematical calculator, but curiosity is both a must and a given. The tone is consistently upbeat but not melodramatic, giving the oddments a sense of reality rather than fantasy—that you could go and witness these phenomena yourself.
One delectable sampler of wonders, there for the asking. (Nonfiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5235-0354-4
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Workman
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
This glossy, colorful title in the “I Want To Be” series has visual appeal but poor organization and a fuzzy focus, which limits its usefulness. Each double-paged layout introduces a new topic with six to eight full-color photographs and a single column of text. Topics include types of environmentalists, eco-issues, waste renewal, education, High School of Environmental Studies, environmental vocabulary, history of environmentalism, famous environmentalists, and the return of the eagle. Often the photographs have little to do with the text or are marginal to the topic. For example, a typical layout called “Some Alternative Solutions” has five snapshots superimposed on a double-page photograph of a California wind farm. The text discusses ways to develop alternative forms of energy and “encourage environmentally friendly lifestyles.” Photos include “a healer who treats a patient with alternative therapy using sound and massage,” and “the Castle,” a house built of “used tires and aluminum cans.” Elsewhere, “Did You Know . . . ” shows a dramatic photo of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, but the text provides odd facts such as “ . . . that in Saudi Arabia there are solar-powered pay phones in the desert?” Some sections seem stuck in, a two-page piece on the effects of “El Niño” or 50 postage-stamp–sized photos of endangered species. The author concludes with places to write for more information and a list of photo credits. Pretty, but little here to warrant purchase. (Nonfiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-15-201862-X
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Mostly speculative at this point, but the topic offers equal measures of promise and provocation.
Introductions to 10 robots modeled on the human body, with thoughts on their current and future uses.
Pepper, a robot designed by a Japanese firm “to provide companionship,” is the only one of the gallery that is currently being produced rather than in a prototype stage. The other nine are mostly built for emergency or industrial work, such as SAFFiR, a “Shipboard Autonomous Firefighting Robot”; Hubo, which can bend and also shift from legs to wheels; and Valkyrie, a NASA project intended for off-Earth work. For each, Becker offers very general physical specifications, a “Mission,” a brief description of its “Superpower,” and a bulleted list of possible applications. More generally, she also takes closer general looks at robotic hands, eyes, and other necessary components, glances at artificial intelligence and its corporeal cousin, embodied intelligence, and discusses the statistical “uncanny valley” or “ick factor” in observers’ reactions to robots that look almost but not quite human. She closes by floating the notion of robots’ rights, suggesting that it might already be too late to keep them from taking over the world. Depicted with glossy realism that fades at the bottom into sketches to show that they are mostly conceptual designs, Ries’ robots—particularly the ones with light- or dark-skinned human faces—stare inscrutably out at viewers.
Mostly speculative at this point, but the topic offers equal measures of promise and provocation. (index, resource list) (Nonfiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-77138-785-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2018
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