OWLS

Gibbons cranks out yet another serviceable but barely interesting volume and this time she’s chosen a topic that could be quite fascinating. First, she offers a basic description; next, several pages of physical characteristics—some, but not all, with subtitles; then a more specific account of barn owls raising young; finally, the requisite nod to environmental issues, with illustrations of bad men cutting down trees. The text limps (“It is believed that there are 21 different kinds of owls living in North America”) and the pictures support but don’t improve it. In fact, on the double-paged spread that shows a variety of owls, one would be hard pressed to see the differences in the rather smeary and sometimes too small illustrations. Worst of all, Gibbons makes no attempt to tell a story or to do much more than list the facts. Encyclopedias engage the reader more effectively, as does the Internet. Schools and libraries have many better options (Jim Arnosky’s All About Owls (1995), for instance) for this topic. (Picture book/nonfiction. 4-8)