GENIUS EARS

The creators of Genius Noses (2023) present a populous gallery of land animals with prominent ears—long, large, tufted, hidden, false, and sometimes red.

The three examples in the “Sometimes Red-Eared” section—Tasmanian devils, black rats, and humans—point to a common theme: External ears serve multiple purposes beyond amplifying outside sounds. So it is that people blush, elephants use theirs as cooling fans, happy rats “smile with their ears,” and wild donkeys swivel their long, expressive auricles like semaphores to signal moods. Anlauf’s entries, translated from German, highlight these animals’ distinctive general features or behaviors and frequently mention characteristic calls or sounds, such as an aye-aye parent’s affectionate ggnoff to its offspring. Following a final set of animals, including the eared leafhopper, which has appendages that look like ears but aren’t (“Leafhopper’s ears are located on the insect’s rear end”), a discursive glossary with diagrams gets into more detail about the inner and outer anatomy of hearing organs. Wild creatures, many sporting small smiles and prominent lashes, look alertly at viewers with direct, friendly gazes in Konstantinov’s animated illustrations. From the tiny jerboa leaping energetically across the title page to the red-eared young couple (one dark-skinned, the other light-skinned and freckled) exchanging an embarrassed glance at the close, the art is loaded with lively appeal.

A particularly engaging addition to natural history shelves.