THE AMAZING ANIMAL ATLAS

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.