Too limited for reference but easy on the eyes and well-suited for browsing and sharing with younger animal lovers.
A select gallery of world wildlife, grouped geographically.
The presentation is notable chiefly for the clean lines and harmonious coloring of Bordicchia’s animal figures and simplified terrain maps. The world tour offers small, naturally posed portraits of several hundred creatures scattered across oversize (and in two cases, large, accordion-folded) leaves with terse accompanying notes highlighting distinctive physical features or behaviors. The maps are largely free of political boundaries and sparsely labeled with major habitat regions. The arbitrarily chosen geographical frames range from Australia (“three million square miles of zoological excitement”) and other continents to Madagascar and the Arctic; the selected animals mix occasional unusual specimens like the raccoonlike olinguito of the Andes and a Pyrenean desman (a riverine mole) with the usual suspects. Aside from a tiny white bicyclist in one scene, humans are absent from the art—even on the “tree” (more like a graceful vine, here) of life at the beginning—but at the thematic center of closing spreads that focus on endangered species, environmental conservation, and the need for sustainable energy sources.
Too limited for reference but easy on the eyes and well-suited for browsing and sharing with younger animal lovers. (index) (Picture atlas. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-909263-11-6
Page Count: 52
Publisher: Flying Eye Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
Lighthearted and informative, though the premise may be a bit stretched.
An amiable introduction to our thrifty, sociable, teeming insect cousins.
Bunting notes that all the ants on Earth weigh roughly the same as all the people and observes that ants (like, supposedly, us) love recycling, helping others, and taking “micronaps.” They, too, live in groups, and their “superpower” is an ability to work together to accomplish amazing things. Bunting goes on to describe different sorts of ants within the colony (“Drone. Male. Does no housework. Takes to the sky. Reproduces. Drops dead”), how they communicate using pheromones, and how they get from egg to adult. He concludes that we could learn a lot from them that would help us leave our planet in better shape than it was when we arrived. If he takes a pass on mentioning a few less positive shared traits (such as our tendency to wage war on one another), still, his comparisons do invite young readers to observe the natural world more closely and to reflect on our connections to it. In the simple illustrations, generic black ants look up at viewers with little googly eyes while scurrying about the pages gathering food, keeping nests clean, and carrying outsized burdens.
Lighthearted and informative, though the premise may be a bit stretched. (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: March 19, 2024
ISBN: 9780593567784
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
A good overview of this complex, essential organ, with an energetic seasoning of silliness.
An introduction to the lead guitar and vocalist for the Brainiacs—the human brain.
The brain (familiar to readers of Seluk’s “The Awkward Yeti” webcomic, which spun off the adult title Heart and Brain, 2015) looks like a dodgeball with arms and legs—pinkish, sturdy, and roundish, with a pair of square-framed spectacles bestowing an air of importance and hipness. Other organs of the body—tongue, lungs, stomach, muscle, and heart—are featured as members of the brain’s rock band (the verso of the dust jacket is a poster of the band). Seluk’s breezy, conversational prose and brightly colored, boldly outlined cartoon illustrations deliver basic information. The brain’s role in keeping the heart beating and other automatic functions, directing body movements, interpreting sights and sounds, remembering smells and tastes, and regulating sleep and hunger are all explained, prose augmented by dialogue balloons and information sidebars. Seluk points out, importantly, that feelings originate in the brain: “You can control how you react…but your feelings happen no matter what.” The parodied album covers on the front endpapers (including the Beatles, Pink Floyd, Green Day, Run DMC, Queen, Nirvana) will amuse parents—or at least grandparents—and the rear endpapers serve up band members’ clever social media and texting screenshots. Backmatter includes a glossary and further brain trivia but no resources or bibliography.
A good overview of this complex, essential organ, with an energetic seasoning of silliness. (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-16700-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Orchard/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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