Stimulating career guidance for young STEM-winders.
A quick course in the skills and background knowledge an astronaut needs.
With the announcement that “You have been selected for astronaut training,” a narrator squires a diverse group of young cartoon figures past sets of small photos of real astronauts in training and larger cartoon views of space and spacecraft, all paired to short explanatory remarks. The course begins with a physical workout, a bit of Russian vocabulary (useful, since astronaut launches are all currently from a Russian base), and a ride on the infamous “Vomit Comet.” In no logical order later spreads introduce constellations and the solar system, take trainees on a trip to the moon, survey galaxies, discuss gravity, preview living and working aboard the ISS, and gather eight luminaries including Laika and Stephen Hawking into an astronautical “Hall of Fame.” The co-published Scientist in Training puts a similarly diverse group in lab coats and offers glimpses of what scientists study, with introductions to fossils, seasons, the water cycle, physical forces, habitats, the human body, and other STEM fields. Aside from a specious claim in the former volume that there “isn’t much gravity in space, so you will float” and in the latter, a slightly misleading claim that scientists “perform exploding experiments,” the informational load, though light, is on-target. Both volumes feature inset spinners on the cover, scattered games within, and multiple-choice review quizzes at the end.
Stimulating career guidance for young STEM-winders. (glossary) (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Sept. 25, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-7534-7442-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Kingfisher
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A gleeful game for budding naturalists.
Artfully cropped animal portraits challenge viewers to guess which end they’re seeing.
In what will be a crowd-pleasing and inevitably raucous guessing game, a series of close-up stock photos invite children to call out one of the titular alternatives. A page turn reveals answers and basic facts about each creature backed up by more of the latter in a closing map and table. Some of the posers, like the tail of an okapi or the nose on a proboscis monkey, are easy enough to guess—but the moist nose on a star-nosed mole really does look like an anus, and the false “eyes” on the hind ends of a Cuyaba dwarf frog and a Promethea moth caterpillar will fool many. Better yet, Lavelle saves a kicker for the finale with a glimpse of a small parasitical pearlfish peeking out of a sea cucumber’s rear so that the answer is actually face and butt. “Animal identification can be tricky!” she concludes, noting that many of the features here function as defenses against attack: “In the animal world, sometimes your butt will save your face and your face just might save your butt!” (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A gleeful game for budding naturalists. (author’s note) (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: July 11, 2023
ISBN: 9781728271170
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks eXplore
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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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