DINOSAUR COUNTDOWN

Oldland provides dinosaur lovers who are learning to count down from 10 with some fodder, but there is no story here, nor a capital letter to speak of.

Beginning with 10 and counting down to “none / no dinosaurs / (they’re extinct, silly!),” Oldland presents readers with some good word choices and vocabulary: towering, lumbering, rearing. The eight “munching herbivores” have plants in their mouths, but the four “roaring carnivores” just have open mouths full of teeth. Sadly, a glossary is lacking. The featured species include Deinosuchus, pterodactyls, Deinonychus, Tyrannosaurus and Stegosaurus. The black-outlined Photoshopped dinosaurs will be the draw for kids. Patterned in earth tones of greens, browns and tans, they feature dots, stripes and splotches, along with somewhat goofy (and toothy) grins. They are easy to count against the stark white background, although some pages have more than the stated number: “ten / striding velociraptors / (and one looming predator)” and “seven / sauntering parasaurolophus / (and what’s that flying overhead?).”  The creatures fill each spread, with the numeral in the top left-hand corner, the text on the right. A pronunciation guide is given, but parents just joining the dino bandwagon will have to flip back and forth, as it is on the last page, and, unfortunately, there is no further information about the dinosaurs.

Large collections with popular dinosaur sections may want to add this, but otherwise, it is one to miss.