Poor Earth. It’s stuck with us.
This picture book challenges children to imagine the Earth as it exists now in a future without humans.
Coy opens his provocative thought experiment by reminding readers, “People need water to live. / We need air to breathe. / We need plants to survive. / But do they need us?” Without humans, infrastructure would begin to break down. “Lightning strikes would cause fires that would burn uncontrolled.” The air and water would become cleaner. Between erosion and unchecked nature, humanity would eventually become a dim planetary memory. Capannelli’s accompanying watercolors depict graffiti-tagged overpasses hung about with blossoming vines, a tree sprouting through a factory’s chimney, the skeletal frames of suburban homes ablaze, the rubble of a long-vacant classroom. Birds and animals roam these places freely. Coy closes by declaring that air, plants, and water don’t “need us,” but we “absolutely” need air, plants, and water. “And because we do, / we must take care, / in all the ways we can, / so we’re here on Earth together / now / and in the future." Coy’s persuasive strategy is weak. Earth without humans is so clearly better off it’s hard to imagine children will be anything but profoundly discouraged by this book. A closing note headed “What Can We Do?” encourages readers broadly to reduce consumption and embrace the outdoors but ultimately fails to empower.
Poor Earth. It’s stuck with us. (author’s note, bibliography) (Picture book. 5-10)Pub Date: March 3, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5415-2357-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Millbrook/Lerner
Review Posted Online: Dec. 7, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
Friends of these pollinators will be best served elsewhere.
This book is buzzing with trivia.
Follow a swarm of bees as they leave a beekeeper’s apiary in search of a new home. As the scout bees traverse the fields, readers are provided with a potpourri of facts and statements about bees. The information is scattered—much like the scout bees—and as a result, both the nominal plot and informational content are tissue-thin. There are some interesting facts throughout the book, but many pieces of trivia are too, well trivial, to prove useful. For example, as the bees travel, readers learn that “onion flowers are round and fluffy” and “fennel is a plant that is used in cooking.” Other facts are oversimplified and as a result are not accurate. For example, monofloral honey is defined as “made by bees who visit just one kind of flower” with no acknowledgment of the fact that bees may range widely, and swarm activity is described as a springtime event, when it can also occur in summer and early fall. The information in the book, such as species identification and measurement units, is directed toward British readers. The flat, thin-lined artwork does little to enhance the story, but an “I spy” game challenging readers to find a specific bee throughout is amusing.
Friends of these pollinators will be best served elsewhere. (Informational picture book. 8-10)Pub Date: May 18, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-500-65265-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Thames & Hudson
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2021
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
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