A manic but solid series kickoff.
A cartoon history of dinosaurs and contemporary creatures, largely hand lettered and (mostly, anyway) colored inside the lines.
Moot the titular hyperbole may be, but it does capture the tone as Lowery sandwiches a populous parade of very simply drawn dinos between a history of prehistory and a roundup of diverse topics, from what paleontologists do to sets of dinosaur jokes and “A Few Kinda Weird (and Unlikely!) Dino Extinction Theories.” Jokes and gags (“Why did the Archaeopteryx get the worm?” “Because it was an early bird!”) are scattered throughout along with side remarks (“Not another mass extinction!”), as are identifying labels with phonetic pronunciations (Gorgonopsia: “GOR-ga-NOP-see-a”) and cogent if dude!-ish observations: “These small weirdos…had one long claw-thing for catching stuff to eat”; “More time passed between Stegosaurus and T. Rex than the time between Velociraptor and microwavable pizza!” Better yet, though true dinosaurs hold the spotlight, flying and marine reptiles, early mammals, and other fabulous early fauna take such frequent star turns that along with infobites galore, readers will come away with a fairly sound understanding of just how dinosaurs fit into the whole history of life on this planet. Human figures of diverse hue occasionally step into view to offer comments or wisecracks.
A manic but solid series kickoff. (bibliography, drawing lessons) (Nonfiction. 7-10)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-35972-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Orchard/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2019
It’s got a few quirky bits, but it’s lackluster overall.
Pop-up dinosaurs, both fossilized and fully fleshed out, join Mesozoic contemporaries in a series of museum displays.
The single-topic spreads are up-to-date but designed to evoke the dusty atmosphere of old-style dinosaur halls (emphasizing this conceit, some are even labeled “Rooms”). They combine cramped blocks of information in smallish type with images of beasts and bones done in a style that resembles the faded naturalism of early-20th-century museum murals—or, in the “Fossil Room,” a desktop covered in paleontological notes with paper clips and coffee stains. Occasional inset spinners and attached booklets supply additional dino details. A tab-activated flipbook attempts to demonstrate tectonic drift, but readers have to go fairly slowly to assimilate it all, which blunts the effect. Amid pale silhouettes representing modern museum visitors, the prehistoric creatures, nearly all of which are small and drably colored, rear up individually or parade along in sedate, motley groups until a closing display and mention of genetic engineering promise a possible future with pet velociraptors.
It’s got a few quirky bits, but it’s lackluster overall. (Informational pop-up picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-7636-9687-0
Page Count: 14
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Sept. 17, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Pretty but insubstantial.
Fifty dinosaurs and kindred contemporaries display their hues in this large-format portrait gallery.
A greater mismatch between the pictures and the accompanying descriptive comments would be hard to imagine. Arranged in no discernable order one or two per spread, Sewell’s dinosaurs float benignly in static poses against white backgrounds. Figures mostly look flat and are roughly the same size, so there are no cues to relative scale. Rather than opening to display jagged dentifrices, mouths are usually closed, often set in small smiles, and the artist indicates details of scales, skin, and other features with just a perfunctory line or color change. Said colors sometimes make vivid contrasts—Velociraptor sports a downright garish mix of blood red and turquoise—but are for the most part pretty blends of hues. In contrast to the art’s weightless harmony, the narrative goes for the gusto: Ceratosaurus “was easily distinguishable by two devil horns, a fearsome nasal spike, a ridge of spikes down its back, and a set of huge gnashers designed for ripping apart the flesh of anything it came across.” Quetzalcoatlus “must have been a worrying sight, the size of a fighter jet wheeling round the sky.” References to “slow-footed” T. rex and “cunning” Utahraptor as well as a claim that Troodons “weren’t exactly rocket scientists” indicate a loose grasp of the difference between fact and speculation to boot.
Pretty but insubstantial. (Nonfiction. 8-10)Pub Date: Oct. 9, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-61689-716-1
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Princeton Architectural Press
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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