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WE ARE HUMAN ANIMALS

Name: WE ARE HUMAN ANIMALS
Author: Rosie Haine
ISBN: 978-0-8028-5601-2

by Rosie Haine ; illustrated by Rosie Haine ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 7, 2023

A first-rate introduction to paleontology for young readers and a fine conversation sparker.

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We’re more closely related to our prehistoric ancestors than we realize.

The author opens this intriguing book provocatively—“We are human animals”—to introduce to readers a Paleolithic dark-skinned, dark-eyed family who lived in what’s now France circa 25,000 years ago. In clearly written prose, she supports her proposition that early people’s lifestyles were somewhat comparable to humans’ lives today. For example, this family’s and their neighbors’ lives were governed by the seasons and nature’s cycles; they banded together cooperatively; they were creative and made art and objects; they wondered about their world and used language. Such ideas will resonate with children, who will be fascinated to learn present-day humans are somewhat connected to very long-ago folk—and, in some ways, may still be compared to them. Adults presenting this volume should encourage kids to discuss their ideas about commonalities shared by present-day and prehistoric people and to consider the author’s use of animals to describe humans and whether they believe this word choice is apt. The digital illustrations, enhanced with handmade textures, are colorful and evocative; children will enjoy the realistic, warm scenes of the prehistoric world and appreciate the similarities portrayed between the worlds of then and now. Endpapers feature faces of racially diverse people. Excellent backmatter concludes the book. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

A first-rate introduction to paleontology for young readers and a fine conversation sparker. (author’s note, examples of prehistoric artifacts) (Informational picture book. 5-9)

Pub Date: March 7, 2023

ISBN: 978-0-8028-5601-2

Page Count: 52

Publisher: Eerdmans

Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2022

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2022

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL SCIENCES

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BUTT OR FACE?

by Kari Lavelle ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 2023

A gleeful game for budding naturalists.

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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

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

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by Kari Lavelle ; illustrated by Bryan Collier

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by Kari Lavelle ; illustrated by Nabi H. Ali

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ANIMAL ARCHITECTS

From the Amazing Animals series

by Amy Cherrix ; illustrated by Chris Sasaki ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 7, 2021

An arguable error of omission and definite errors of commission sink this otherwise attractive effort.

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A look at the unique ways that 11 globe-spanning animal species construct their homes.

Each creature garners two double-page spreads, which Cherrix enlivens with compelling and at-times jaw-dropping facts. The trapdoor spider constructs a hidden burrow door from spider silk. Sticky threads, fanning from the entrance, vibrate “like a silent doorbell” when walked upon by unwitting insect prey. Prairie dogs expertly dig communal burrows with designated chambers for “sleeping, eating, and pooping.” The largest recorded “town” occupied “25,000 miles and housed as many as 400 million prairie dogs!” Female ants are “industrious insects” who can remove more than a ton of dirt from their colony in a year. Cathedral termites use dirt and saliva to construct solar-cooled towers 30 feet high. Sasaki’s lively pictures borrow stylistically from the animal compendiums of mid-20th-century children’s lit; endpapers and display type elegantly suggest the blues of cyanotypes and architectural blueprints. Jarringly, the lead spread cheerfully extols the prowess of the corals of the Great Barrier Reef, “the world’s largest living structure,” while ignoring its accelerating, human-abetted destruction. Calamitously, the honeybee hive is incorrectly depicted as a paper-wasps’ nest, and the text falsely states that chewed beeswax “hardens into glue to shape the hive.” (This book was reviewed digitally.)

An arguable error of omission and definite errors of commission sink this otherwise attractive effort. (selected sources) (Informational picture book. 5-8)