Dinosaurs by Rachel Ignotofsky

Dinosaurs aims to present the evolution of life on Earth in an engaging way to young readers. Before embarking on this incredible journey through time, Ignotofsky provides readers with some background information. There are pages that provide explanations of the Geological Time Scale, What Is A Dinosaur?, Understanding Plate Tectonics, Ever Changing Geography, What Is a Fossil?, Reading The Rocks, Mass Extinction Events, and Understanding Evolution. This all sets the stage for exploring life on Earth.

The story begins with the PreCambrian SuperEon, the first four billion years of Earth's history, when the planet formed in the solar system. This period includes the Hadean Ion, the Archean Eon, and the Proterozoic Eon. There are many interesting facts about this time such as during the Hadean Ion the moon was close to fifteen times closer to Earth, during the Archean Ion the oceans were much saltier than they are today, and during the Proterozoic Eon the first mega continent formed. It was during the Proterozoic that the Great Oxygenation Event occured.

Life before the dinosaurs in the Paleozoic Era began to colonize land. The Paleozoic Era has been divided into six geological periods: Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and Permian. The Cambrian saw many new life forms develop. This has been termed the Cambrian Explosion in which creatures with the first backbone, the first lungs and the first legs appeared. The Ordovician saw a huge increase in biodiversification, now termed the Ordovician Biodiversification Event  that saw the development of jawless fishes, tentacled cephalopods and starfishes. The Late Ordovician experienced a mass extinction event, the first of five such events to occur in geological history. The Silurian Period was a relatively quiet time during which fish continued to evolve.

In the Devonian Period much of the Earth's continents covered by warm, shallow seas." It was the age of fishes and coral reefs. A second mass extinction event, the Late Devonian mass extinction occurred but its cause is unknown.  The Carboniferous Period saw swamps and rainforests proliferate. The oxygen content of Earth's atmosphere was also very high at this time as carbon was trapped in the plants and trees. The largest terrestrial invertebrate to ever live, Arthropleura millipede which was eight feet long, inhabited the swamps of the Carboniferous Period.

The Permian Period saw the formation of the giant supercontinent Pangea, surrounded by the global ocean called Panthalassa. Reptiles thrived in the arid, warm interior of the continent. The Permian-Triassic mass extinction event closed out this period.

The Mesozoic Era was the age of the dinosaurs. Three periods have been designated in the Mesozoic: the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous.  The Mesozoic Era began with the worst mass extinction and would end with the devastation of an asteroid impact. Earth had no polar ice caps as the planet was very warm. A day in the Mesozoic Era was twenty-three hours.

The Triassic Period saw the development of a new branch of reptiles - the archosaurs that included the dinosaurs. They were not the large creatures expected but were small. The Jurassic Period saw Pangea begin to break apart due to tectonic activitiy. During this time, it became two separate continents, Laurasia and Gondwana. Rainforests replaced the arid deserts of Pangea, providing a significant source of food for dinosaurs. The Cretacious Period was the climax of the dinosaur's reign. Tyrannosaurus rex the apex predator on land, azhdarchid pterosaurs in the air and Mosasaurus in the oceans. An asteroid impacting the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico would end their reign.

The beginning of the Cenozoic era, the three main mammal groups were already established. These were the monotremes  (egg-laying mammals), marsupials (mammals that birth live young and carry them with a pouch), and placentals (mammals who give birth to live young from the womb).  During the Cenozoic Era, Earth developed large polar ice caps. There were three periods in the Cenozoic Era: the Paleogene Period, Neogene Period and Quaternary Period.

The Paleogene Period saw large fluctuations in climate. This period was one of mountain building with the creation of the Rocky Mountains and the Himilayan Mountains.

During the Neogene Period the abundance of grasslands saw mammals adapt to running from predators. Early hominids began to evolve to walk upright. The Panama Land Bridge connecting North and South America developed during this time. This land bridge allowed animals and plants to inhabit new areas in what has been called the Great American Biotic Interchange. It also separated the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, changing ocean currents and weather patterns.

The Quaternanry Period was dominated by multiple ice ages. Animals adapted by becoming large and furry and were known as megafauna. They included mammoths, woolly rhinos and saber-tooth tigers. Modern humans evolved during this period and migrated to all areas of the planet. Humans transformed Earth's ecosystems. 

Finally, the Holocene Epoch which represents the last eleven thousand years of Earth history, is the time in which humans formed civilizations.

Discussion

Dinosaurs is a colourfully illustrated and engaging large picture book that offers a detailed summary of the evolution of life on Earth.  The title is somewhat misleading as the book's focus is more on geological history rather than exclusively on dinosaurs.

After providing some information on important concepts that will be encountered in the book, Ignotofsky launches into descriptions of life during each of the geological eras and their periods. After introducing each period of geologic time life is described in more detail through several features. The Land and Sea provides an overview of each period and there is also a Fun Facts section. For example, in the Devonian Period Fun Facts, the Australian lungfish which has gills and lungs is featured. Each section also has a fascinating "Stories of Discovery" section which highlights various important discoveries relevant to that geologic time period. Some of the features include the Canadian Burgess Shale, and discoveries in the Silurian rocks near the village of Chuanhegai in China, and on Ellesmere island in the high Arctic of Canada. Once the story moves into the Mesozoic Era, life on Earth is divided into two sections, Life on Land, and Air and Sea.

Each geologic period has a Creature Feature which describes some of the life in that period, hopefully based on fossil evidence, although Ignotofsky doesn't specify what is the basis for the descriptions and illustrations. Nevertheless, this makes for a very interesting part of the book.

Overall, Dinosaurs is a very well done, well-written with many interesting facts, colourful illustrations with a well thought-out layout. But there is just so much information, much of it very detailed, that it is questionable as to what age this will appeal to. For younger readers, the visuals will be most appealing, especially the Creature Feature secction, but the large amount of text, most of it in very small font to accomodate the amount of information may feel daunting. Nevertheless, this adult with a background as a geologist found it very appealing!

Book Details:

Dinosaurs by Rachel Ignotofsky

New York: Ten Speed Press    2025

127 pp.

Earth's Extraordinary Places: Galapagos by Tom Jackson

Galapagos is a fact-filled, colourful book for young readers about this extraordinary place. Galapagos opens with a detailed map showing the main islands (there are one hundred twenty-eight!) in the Galapagos archipelago. The Galapagos are the product of a hot spot - a plume of magma beneath the islands. Part of the Nazca Plate, one of many tectonic plates that make up the Earth's crust. As the plate drifts over the hotspot, new volcanoes form, creating new islands in the archipelago.

The shield volcanoes, types of lava, and some of the unique volcanic features on the Galapagos are also explored. Jackson then goes on to highlight the importance of the Galapagos' location in the Pacific Ocean and how the meeting of three ocean currents has created the nutrient-rich waters that sustain the archipelago's unique wildlife.

No book about the Galapagos Islands would be complete without information about the voyage of the Beagle and Charles Darwin's visit to the islands in 1835. Darwin's observations of the species of plants and animals unique to each island led him, later on, to write his Origin of Species, explaining his theory of evolution by natural selection.

A large part of the book offers an in-depth look at the wildlife on Galapagos, including reptiles (iguanas and large tortoises), birds, marine life and plants. 

The chapter on plant focuses on the five different plant zones on the islands and the unique trees, shrubs and other plants that thrive in each zone.

The final chapter, People and Preservation explores the people who live on the Galapagos - known as Galapaguenos and how the arrival of humans on the islands has impacted the ecosystems there.

Discussion

Galapagos is a detailed, colourful and engaging book for young readers, offering them an in-depth look at this unique archipelago. Readers are provided with maps throughout the book to help orient them and the Galapagos story begins with an explanation as to how the islands formed. Jackson then explains how life arrived on these islands which seem so isolated. This provides a clean seque into the voyage of the Beagle and Charles Darwin's observations that eventually led him to propose his theory of evolution.

There are plenty of colour photographs, colourful illustrations, maps and charts to hold the interest of younger readers. Each page is filled with interesting facts presented in short, simple text. Unfortunately, much of the text tends to very small and on some pages, the black text on a dark background, usually purples, blues and greens make reading difficult.

Overall, this is a well written, fascinating book about the Galapagos that will be sure to inspire young readers to learn more about this unique place, to work to preserve our planet's ecosystems and, maybe even to travel to the Galapagos one day. 

Book Details:

Earth's Extraordinary Places: Galapagos by Tom Jackson
New York: DK Publishing   2022
127 pp.

Sky Wolf's Call: The gift of Indigenous Knowledge by Eldon Yellowhorn and Kathy Lowinger

Canada shares the land with around six hundred First Nations while within the United States, there are five hundred seventy-three tribes. Their collective Indigenous knowledge shares many similar ideas including,

"Everything is connected.
The world is a gift.
The sacred is a vital part of knowing.
We are always learning."

The first chapter explores what this means by taking each idea and providing examples from Indigenous knowledge. For example, to explain the first Indigenous concept, Yellowhorn demonstrates the connection between pecan nuts and the squirrels who collect them as food. In this chapter readers learn about the Menominee Nation who manage a sawmill with forest conservation practices that ensure the forest will exist generations from now. Other Indigenous practices such as learning to use the cocao beans to make a delicious drink or repurposing the qulliq, an oil lamp once used by the Inuit to heat their homes and cook food is now part of Inuit ceremonies.

In the Mi'kmaq language, Etauapmumk means "two-eyed seeing": "One eye sees with the strengths of Indigenous ways of knowing and the other eye sees a scientific worldview. Etuapmumk means learning to use both eyes together for the benefit of all." As an example, the Inuit who live in the Arctic can observe the changes climate change has brought about in the sea ice and the animals that live there. They inform the scientists who study the effects of climate change.

 Chapter 2, Water Knowledge explores the knowledge that comes from the Indigenous belief that water is sacred and needs to be protected. The beaver is an example of the connection between  water, animals and humans. Indigenous use of water knowledge is given in a few examples: the Hohokam canals used to irrigate crops, the Mi'kmaw use of waterways to travel great distances and the Calusa in Florida who "built their watercraft from hollowed-out cypress logs."

This chapter highlights some of the issues Indigenous peoples have experienced regarding water: the effect dams like the Grand Coulee Dam have had on salmon runs on the Columbia River, lack of potable water for over fifty years in the Anishinable community of Grassy Narrows in northwestern Ontario. This chapter also profiles several Indigenous activists who have worked to protect water.

Chapter 3 considers Fire and Smoke knowledge. It's believed that smoke connects our breath to the heavens and fire is a great gift that cooks our food and can be part of the life cycle. This chapter explores smudging and sacred pipes as well as the Navajo Fire Dance. It also presents the ways Indigenous peoples used cultural burns to help keep forests healthy.

Chapter 4 explores Indigenous knowledge as it relates to food security. The Mi'kmaq term, Netukulimuk informs Indigenous ways. It means, "take only what is needed and waste nothing." In this chapter the gifts of the buffalo, the salmon and plants are explored. Some of the topics covered include the restoration of free-roaming buffalo to the Great Plains in both Canada and the U.S. by Indigenous scientists, the reclaiming of ancient aquaculture such as restoring ancient clam gardens used for centuries by the Coastal peoples in British Columbia, Alaska and Baffin Island, and the use of the "three sisters" - corn, beans and squash to feed Indigenous peoples for centuries.

Chapter 5 Healing Knowledge Ways explores how "Indigenous peoples think about health and healing." It is a system based on the belief that there must be harmony between the body, mind and spirit. Indigenous healing focuses on restoring that harmony. This includes the Medicine Wheel, the Sweat Lodge and playing games. Indigenous knowledge also focuses on restoring harmony between man and the environment. One of the examples in this chapter is the Lutsel K'e Dene First Nation who are leaders in boreal forest conservation.

Sky Knowledge, Chapter 6 focuses on  how "Indigenous astronomers studied the sun, moon, planets and stars to give us our maps, our calendar, beliefs about how to govern, and even directions for building our homes." In this chapter, Wayfinding using Polaris, marking time using the lunar cycle and Indigenous scientists who now study the sky are the focus here.

How Indigenous peoples are working to ensure their knowledge is not lost, is the focus of Chapter 7. Oral narratives were the means Indigenous peoples passed knowledge from one generation to the next. How this was done is the focus here with the importance of language in the transfer of knowledge discussed. The profiles of several Indigenous knowledge keepers is highlighted.

In Sky Wolf's Call, Chapter 8, the story of the Sky Wolf encourages us to work together as everything in our world is connected, to cherish the gifts of our world, and to give thank for these gifts.

Discussion

Sky Wolf's Call is a fascinating look into the various types of Indigenous Knowledge and how it is being applied by today's Indigenous peoples and Indigenous scientists.

Yellowhorn begins by introducing his readers to what makes up Indigenous knowledge and how it is passed on and retelling the Blackfoot story of cultural hero and trickster,Naapi and the Sky Wolves who helped Indigenous peoples survive on the new world that Naapi had created. Using this Blackfoot story of the lessons the Sky Wolves gave, Sky Wolf's Call goes on to present the various kinds of Indigenous knowledge beginning with water knowledge.

A constant theme in this informative book is the braiding together of Indigenous knowledge with Indigenous peoples stories, the teachings of the Elders and Knowledge Keepers, and Indigenous observations and inventions. The authors use Indigenous stories to showcase their beliefs and how these informed their practices, particularly in the management of natural resources. 

One special strength of Sky Wolf's Call are the Meet sections where the contributions of a specific Indigenous Knowledge Keeper is featured. There are plenty of photographs to engage younger readers and Yellowhorn includes plenty of very interesting facts.

SkyWolf's Call is both informative and engaging, offering readers a window into the beliefs and practices of Canada's Indigenous peoples. It is a unique approach to the natural world and the understanding of the interconnectedness between humans and our world and offers a call to all peoples to work to preserve the gift of our planet.

Includes a Glossary, Selected Reading, Sources and Contacts, Image credits and an Index.

Book Details:

Sky Wolf's Call by Eldon Yellowhorn and Kath Lowinger
Toronto: Annick Press Ltd.
120 pp.

The First Dinosaur by Ian Lendler

The First Dinosaur tells the remarkable story of how scholars and scientists came to unravel the mystery of ancient life on Earth and to discover the dinosaur. The First Dinosaur traces the journey, step by step by telling the story of how the first four bones of the first dinosaur, Megalosaurus were found and ended up as part of a collection of fifteen bones in total. But within that story are multiple other stories of men and one woman who worked tirelessly to unravel the story of the Earth's past.

The Megalosaurus story begins with the discovery of a bone, two feet long and weighing twenty pounds by workers in a quarry in Oxfordshire, England in 1676. Dr. Plot, a chemistry professor at Oxford University, did not know that he was looking at the bone from an extinct animal that was in fact the first dinosaur, Megalosaurus. At this time, no one knew that reptiles of enormous size once roamed the Earth. The remains of animals, dug up out of quarries weren't really understood. They were called "formed stones" and people did not know where they came from, what they were or how they were formed.

To try to understand what he was given, Plot compared his bone with that of an elephant and saw that it was much larger. He believed it may have come from a race of giant humans. What he did do was record his observations for future scientists, measuring, describing and drawing the unusual bone in his book, The Natural History of Oxfordshire. 

In 1666, an enormous white shark was caught by fisherman in the Mediterranean Sea. Florence had become a learning center of science, so the Grand Duke of the city ordered it to be brought to his city. The Grand Duke Ferdinand de' Medici had created the Accademia del Cimento or "school of experiments" in 1657. It was the beginning of the Scientific Revolution and Florence was the center of new scientific endeavours. It embodied new way of thinking about the world. Previously "many European scholars believed that all human knowledge was contained in a few books, such as the Holy Bible." The students and professors of the Accademia  were the first to use Galileo's scientific method of observing and questioning.

Nicolaus Steno, a master dissectionist who dissected human cadavers to learn the secrets of the human body, was invited by Grand Duke Ferdinand to the Accademia. Steno, in his dissection of the shark head, noted that the teeth in the shark were similar to the "tongue stones" found by the thousands in Malta. In his book about the shark dissection, Steno wrote that the tongue stones were shark teeth, connecting the living animal with the remains of once living animals in the ground. He was the first to determine WHAT fossils are - the remains of animals and plants. And in fact, we now know that "tongue stones" are teeth from megalodons, giant prehistoric sharks that lived millions of years ago.

Robert Hooke, a scientist who improved many instruments such as the microscope, read Steno's book and was fascinated. Hooke was the first person to apply the scientific method by working in a laboratory and running experiments.  Hooke published a book, Micrographia, of his drawings of the natural world as seen through the microscope. His observations led him to theorize that fossils or "formed stones" might be the result of a process he called "Petrifaction".

In seventeenth century Europe and England, the idea of extinction, that entire species of animals and plants could die out was not considered possible. This was because the Bible was taken literally and it was thought that all the animals currently alive on the Earth had been there from the beginning of a world that was believed to be 6000 years old. However, Hooke, through his studies of fossils, began to consider the possibility that the past might look very different from the present and that fossils were the clue to helping understand the past. 

Collecting fossils was a pastime of the aristocrats that had begun several hundred years earlier. These fossils became a type of entertainment kept in a "cabinet of curiosities". Eventually a large museum, the Ashmolean Museum, housing a huge collection of fossils and "curiosities" opened at Oxford University and was overseen by Dr. Plot. The fascination with fossils created a booming industry in which fossils were dug up and sold by quarry workers in Oxford.

In 1699, Dr. Edward Llwyd saw a large tooth for sale in the window of a quarry worker's house in Stonesfield, a small town outside of Oxford. The quarries in this area were rich with fossils and this fossil tooth was different - it was the type of tooth used to rip flesh. It was in fact, the second Megalosaurus fossil and it came to be stored at the Ashmolean Museum. 

At this time many scientists were struggling to understand what was called "the Seashell Problem". Many fossilized fish skeletons and sea shells were found in rocks well above sea level, in mountains and even deserts. How could this be? To solve the seashell problem scientists needed to understand "Where do fossils come from?" and "Why are they found where they are?" Nicolas Steno in searching for answers to these questions went to Malta where the tongue stones were found and through observation developed what came to be known as Steno's First Law of Super-Position: "...rocks form in flat layers on top of one another." This meant that the oldest rocks formed the bottom layers. So how to account for younger rocks that contained seashells?

To answer these questions meant that scientists had to reconsider the time frame of the Earth. In the early 1700's calculations by James Ussher, an archbishop of the Church of Ireland determined that the Earth was formed on Sunday, October 23, 4004 B.C. But more and more, the evidence in the rocks did not support the biblical view of life on Earth. Scholars had turned to the Bible for answers and believed that Noah's Flood was the explanation.  However, some scholars began to think differently and offered strange and unusual theories to explain the seashell problem. 

By this time, the third fossil unknowingly belonging to the Megalosaurus was purchased by Sir Christopher Pegge. It was a large jawbone with some intact teeth and it too ended up in the Ashmolean Museum.

The next major development came with the birth of the Industrial Revolution and the use of coal to run factories. With the construction of canals to transport coal to factories in the cities, William Smith, an engineer was able to map the layers of rock that were exposed with each excavation. Smith came to recognize the same layers or strata as he called them, that he had noticed during his work in the Mearns Pit coal mine. Smith began mapping the strata all over England using the fossils he found in each layer and eventually created a geological map of England. This process took him 14 years. The importance of Smith's work is that he "understood that the strata and their fossils were telling a story" of the past in England.

Each new discovery simply generated more questions: "Why did each strata start and stop?...What causes these eras to come to an end?...What happened to the animals who were alive when the end came?..." From this point on, Lendler follows the story into France where revolution let to drastic social change and new ideas about the natural world. One key idea was proposed by renowned scientist Georges Culvier: life on Earth experienced extinctions on a catastrophic scale.

As more fossils were discovered, scientists began to realize the world was much older than they had ever thought, and that there was a world before humans and before that a world even before mammals. William Buckland, Mary Anning, Gideon Mantell, Richard Owen and Charles Lyell would all work in their own way to change forever how we think about the past.

It would be Culvier, with his brilliant ability to identify a collection of fifteen bones at the Ashmolean Museum, as a new type of land reptile that had never been seen before. This was the Megalosaurus. The discovery would be William Buckland's to announce to the scientific community. The age of dinosaurs had begun again....

Discussion

The First Dinosaur is detailed and fascinating account of how scientists came to discover dinosaurs. To do so required a monumental shift in how scientists viewed our world and our place in the world and how we viewed the past. 

Ian Lendler takes readers on a 200 year journey from the first known discovery of what would eventually be identified as a dinosaur bone to the coining of the word "dinosaur" by Richard Owen and and exhibition of the first dinosaurs at the Crystal Palace in London. Along this journey, young readers will meet many of the major players, who not only worked long arduous hours searching for fossils, but who often struggled for years to have their efforts recognized. In some cases, such as Mary Anning, their contributions would take centuries to be recognized. 

His portrayal of the main players offers interesting perspectives on characters such as William Buckland, Gideon Mantell, Richard Owen and Mary Anning. Young readers will find each person comes alive on the pages of The First Dinosaur. There is William Buckland whose over-the-top personality  included eating every kind of animal he could find. Gideon Mantell whose obsession with fossils saw him lose both money and family while making fantastic contributions to science. Richard Owen whose hatred of Mantell led him to actively work against this good man even after Mantell's death. And Mary Anning who discovered three of the dinosaurs on exhibit at the Crystal Palace but whose enormous contributions to paleontology went unrecognized for 200 years. Lendler also touches on the relationships many of these men had with one another and how the class structure in England influenced scientific endeavours.

One of the more interesting aspects Lendler features is the move away from a biblical perspective that early geologists and paleontologists had to make. In the seventeenth century man's place in the cosmos was based heavily on what was taught in the Bible. But the Bible is not a scientific work but rather an account of man's relationship with God. This was not the view of the Bible in the seventeenth century because it was considered a history of the world with the most important events recorded. Galileo was the first to challenge the way man would think about himself in the universe. For many scientists such as Richard Owen, there was no reconciling the biblical version with these new ideas. For others like William Buckland, who spent his life trying to prove Noah's flood, the new ideas prevailed.

Lendler touches on the effects revolutions played in the discovery of dinosaurs, including the Scientific Revolution, the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. He shows how these revolutions changed society and brought about different ways of thinking.

While there is a much detail in this book that might bog down younger readers, Lendler entices his readers with plenty of interesting photographs, illustrations done in pen, ink and digital medium and sidebars of information. There is a Bibliography, an Index, and Lendler includes an Epilogue which tells what happened to the major players in the quest for the first dinosaur. The First Dinosaur is a must read for those who are interested in dinosaurs and the past. 

Book Details:

The First Dinosaur by Ian Lendler
Toronto: Margaret K. McElderry Books     2019
220 pp.

Destination Moon by Seymour Simon

In Destination Moon, prolific children's science writer Seymour Simon chronicles the events leading up to the American Moon landing in July of 1969. As expected the story opens with United States president John F. Kennedy's famous speech at Rice University in Houston, Texas on September 12, 1962. In that speech, Kennedy challenged America to put a man on the moon before the end of the decade. This was the start of the space race between the United States and the Communist Soviet Union.

With each page featuring full colour photographs, Simon begins by explaining the importance of learning more about the Moon to aid in our understanding of the solar system and provides so he provides readers with some basic information about our closest neighbour in the solar system.

The space era was initiated by the launch of the Soviet Union and the world's first artificial satellite, Sputnik in October of 1957. The American's followed with their Explorer satellite missions.The Explorer 3 mission confirmed the existence of the Earth's magnetic fields and their protective function against damaging cosmic rays.

Destination Moon describes Project Mercury which ran from 1958 to 1963. Its six missions were designed to place an astronaut into orbit and safely return him to Earth. The group of astronauts chosen for these missions were called the "Mercury Seven" and were chosen from military test pilots. The seven were Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton.

Project Gemini which spanned the years 1961 to 1966, was the next step to the moon. Its purpose was to solve some of the problems associated with landing on the Moon. In an attempt to learn more about conditions on the Moon, NASA sent seven unmanned reconnaissance missions using the Surveyor spacecraft to the Moon. Surveyor also tested the use of retro-rockets to slow down a space craft so it could achieve a soft landing.

The objective of Project Apollo from 1963 to 1972, was to land man on the Moon. Simon takes his young readers through the obstacles engineers encountered as they planned the spacecraft that would take man to the Moon. Full colour photographs accompanied by detailed text explain the Lunar Module, the Eagle and its landing on Tranquility Base, astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin's moon walks and the challenge to return to Earth safely.

As 2019 is the fiftieth anniversary of the Moon landings, Destination Moon is yet another of many  books written for young readers offering them all the details of the race to the Moon and the historic landing on the Moon. Seymour Simon sets the stage in his Author's Note at the very beginning, by recounting his own personal experience of watching the moon walk on the night of July 20, 1969, an event I too remember very well even though I was only ten years old! Seymour Simon was a dad at the time whose two children "Robert and Michael, cheered as Neil Armstrong climbed down the ladder of the Eagle and stepped out onto the surface of the Moon."

Seymour Simon includes plenty of factoids throughout his picture book. For example the contribution of the human computers, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson and Dorothy Vaughan to the success of the early Mercury missions is highlighted. Adults will remember their story as told in the book and movie, Hidden Figures. There is an interesting section on how the Apollo mission impacted the families of the astronauts and mention also of the speech President Richard Nixon had prepared should the astronauts fail to leave the surface of the Moon. Thankfully that disaster never materialized.

The author employs simple text and explains some basic concepts such as escape velocity and rocket stages. Terms that may be new to readers such as seismometer and basalt are highlighted in bold blue text and are explained in the Glossary at the back. A timeline summary of the Race to Space can also be found at the back.


 A great gift for the budding young astronomer.

Book Details:

Destination Moon by Seymour Simon
New York: HarperCollins     2019

Some Writer! : The Story of E.B. White by Melissa Sweet

Some Writer! traces the life of Elwyn Brooks White, the author of the much loved children's storybooks, Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little.

White's own story began in 1899 in Mount Vernon, New York. White knew at an early age that he loved to write. He was the youngest child in a family of six children and spent many idyllic summers in Belgrade Lakes, Maine. His father rented several cottages at Snug Harbor and the family would travel to Maine every summer. During the summer White learned to canoe, and he spent time swimming in the lake and studying the things many young boys find fascinating: turtles, toads and tadpoles.

White began sending his writing in for publication at the age of nine! His poem, "A Story of a Little Mouse" won him his first literary prize. In high school White wrote for the school newspaper, the Oracle. Throughout White's teen years, World War I raged and he lamented about not being able to enlist (he did not meet the weight requirements).

White attended Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. There he was nicknamed Andy after the first president of Cornell by his classmates. He wrote for the Cornell Sun, eventually becoming editor. White worked as a counselor at Camp Otter located on Otter Lake near Dorset, Ontario during the summers of 1920 and 1921. Camp Otter was a summer camp for boys, owned by the director of physical education at Cornell. In the summer of 1921, he was accompanied by a friend Howard "Cush" Cushman.

In 1922, White along with Cushman traveled westward, across America, arriving in Seattle, Washington six months later. After a brief stint as a reporter for the Seattle Times, White headed to Alaska and Siberia and then returned home to New York. He lived with his parents for a time while working in advertising in Manhattan. Then in 1925, White began writing for a new magazine, The New Yorker. This was the real beginning of White's literary career.

White was a well-known writer and essayist when Anne Carroll Moore, a children's librarian at the New York Public Library wrote him suggesting he write a children's book. He decided to create a story out of his notes he had made years earlier of a dream about a mouse. While working as a writer at the New Yorker, White once experienced a dream when travelling on a train. The dream was about a dapper little mouse who wore a hat and carried a cane. He wrote down the details of the dream and over time added more chapters. It was this story E.B. White reworked and ultimately submitted to his new editor, Ursula Nordstrom at Harper and Brothers. While Ursula loved the story of Stuart Little, librarian Ann Carroll Moore did not. Although it was published in 1945, Stuart Little was not approved by some librarians and the book was even banned in some libraries. Children, however, loved the book.

But White's best was yet to come - inspired in part by life on his farm in Maine.

Discussion

Melissa Sweet has written a biography of E.B. White that is chockful of fascinating facts and insights about the author of one of the best books ever written for children. Some Writer! is a visually appealing book, filled with maps, photographs, artwork and collages created by Melissa Sweet. Also  included are much archival information: photographs of E.B.White, copies of his journal pages, poetry, correspondence and drafts of his work for Stuart Little and Charlotte's Web, as well as photographs of his wife and son and his farm.

Although most of White's writing was for adults, he is probably best remembered for what it considered his finest work - Charlotte's Web, a story about the meaning of friendship in which a spider saves the life of a pig. It is also an unusual in that as a children's book, Charlotte's Web asks children to think about death and how one goes on after the loss of a special person in life. The death of White's pig Fred on his farm, was the driving force behind this story, one in which White wanted a miraculous way to save a pig!

In Some Writer! we learn the origins of two of the most beloved storybooks for children, Stuart Little and Charlotte's Web. Sweet discusses the controversy that erupted over Stuart Little's "birth" and how unbelievably this led to librarians banning the book. It was White who wrote "...children can sail easily over the fence that separates reality from make-believe. A fence that can throw a librarian is nothing to a child." It's revealing to read how White struggled to write the opening for Charlotte's Web and how illustrator Garth Williams worked to create the face of Charlotte, a grey spider identified as Aranea cavatica.

Although Some Writer! is a biography written for young readers, adults will find Sweet's book a fascinating read with all of the artwork and bits of information about Elwyn Brooks White. Melissa Sweet has included an Author's Note, a Timeline, a Notes section, a Selected Bibliography and an Afterword written by Martha White, the grand daughter of E.B. White who fully endorses this bibilography.  Sweet's Some Writer! truly captures both his personal life and the impetus of his creative work, providing readers with a window into this most amazing and versatile writer.

Book Details:

Some Writer!: The Story of E.B. White by Melissa Sweet
Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt      2016
162 pp.

Women Who Dared: 52 Stories of Fearless Daredevils, Adventurers & Rebels by Linda Skeers

Women Who Dared features stories of remarkable women who were fearless in their quest to follow their dreams. Linda Skeers has put together a fascinating collection of stories that will captivate young and not-so-young readers.

The book is divided into three sections: Daredevils, Adventurers and Rebels. In Daredevils, readers will meet Annie Edson Taylor who decided to take the plunge over Niagara Falls, Florence Chadwick who swam the English Channel-both ways, Lillian Boyer who was an aerial acrobat and Valentina Tereshkova, a cosmonaut who orbited Earth forty-eight times.

The Adventurers section introduces readers to Barbara Hillary, explorer of both the North and South Poles, Beatrice Ayettey who grew up in Ghana and became that country's first maritime captain, Dr. Eugenie Clark whose passion for the sea led her study sharks, and Canadian Mina Hubbard who explored the uncharted wilds of Labrador.

The final section, Rebels describes the heroic efforts of Alia Muhammad Baker, chief librarian in the Al Basrah Central Library in Basra, Iraq to save the rare books from destruction during the Iraq War. Readers will also meet Irene Sendler who save 2,500 Jewish children from death during World War II, Keiko Fukudo who was one of the first women to master judo, Margaret "Molly" Tobin Brown, who survived the sinking of the Titanic and Minnie Spotted Wolf a member of the Blackfeet Nation who became the first Native American woman to join the U.S. Marine Corps.

Some of the women profiled are well known, such as (unsinkable) Molly Brown, Irene Sendler and Mary Anning. Others such as Amelia Earhart and Nellie Bly are missing.  Each one page biography is accompanied by a colourful rendering of the person profiled by illustrator Livi Gosling. While most of the women featured are American, Skeers does include women from other countries including Canada, Ghana, France, Japan, Mexico, Poland, Jamaica, England, France and Nicaragua.  There is an extensive Bibliography at the back of the book for further research. This is a great companion volume to Women in Science by Rachel Ignotofsky.

Book Details:

Women Who Dared by Linda Skeers
Naperville, Illinois:  Sourcebooks, Inc.       2017
112pp.

Women In Science: 50 fearless pioneers who changed the world by Rachel Ignotofsky

Women in Science presents the stories of fifty remarkable women who pushed back against the social conventions and attitudes that limited their participation in science, to achieve their dream. In the past, women faced many restrictions in obtaining a higher education, often refused entry into most scientific disciplines and were usually not allowed to present their research at conventions or publish their work in scientific journals. But where there is a will, there is a way. Despite overwhelming odds and little recognition, many women achieved their dreams and made remarkable contributions that helped improve the lives of people.

Ignotofsky's Women In Science presents some of these women, many of whom will not be known to younger or older readers. Among those profiled are the well known:

• Kathryn Johnson, physicist and mathematician whose story was told in the recent film, Hidden Figures.
• Barbara McClintock, ctyogeneticist who discovered that genes could "jump".
• Rosalind Franklin, chemist and x-ray crystallographer who discovered the shape of DNA.
• Marie Curie, chemist and physicist who (along with her husband Pierre) discovered the radioactive elements polonium and radium and who also discovered radiation.
• Rachel Carson, marine biologist and conservationist, who wrote Silent Spring and was the impetus for the banning of the pesticide DDT.
• Ada Lovelace,a mathematician wrote the first recognized computer program
• Elizabeth Blackwell, became the first woman doctor in America.

The profiles are listed chronologically, based on each woman's birthdate, beginning with Hypatia, a Greek astronomer. Each profile consists of two pages; one page containing a short bio, the other a detailed illustration of the woman scientist done in Ignotofsky's unique style. Ignotofsky's artwork in Women In Science is a testament to her "passion for taking dense information and making it fun and accessible." Ignotofsky who is an honors graduate of the Tyler School of Art's graphic design program believes "that illustration is a powerful tool that can make learning exciting." Readers will find that the author-illustrator has made each of the fifty biographies fascinating reading and an inspiration to young women, especially those who are interested in science. Rachel Ignotofsky's website,  provides more information about her work.

At the back of the book there's a detailed section outlining sources including films, websites and books, as well as an index.Women In Science is a must-read for any girl interested in science because it will give her a sense of history, the struggle women before her faced and the courage to follow her dreams, should that dream be to become a scientist.

Book Details:

Women In Science: 50 fearless pioneers who changed the world by Rachel Ignotofsky
Berkeley, California:  Ten Speed Press       2016
127 pp.

Last Airlift: A Vietnamese Orphan's Rescue from War/ One Step at a Time by Marsha Forchuck Skrypuch

Marsha Skrypuch has written two short books for young readers that tell the story of eight year old Son Thi Anh Tuyet, a Vietnamese orphan who was adopted by a family from Brantford, Ontario. Living in an orphanage in Saigon, in 1975, Tuyet  had been crippled by polio when younger and was suffering from psychological trauma as a result of  her experiences during the Vietnam War.

With the fall of South Vietnam and its capital city, Saigon, to the North Vietnamese communists, the West began to evacuate children and babies from orphanages all over the city. Tuyet was one of fifty-seven babies and children airlifted out of Saigon and flown to Toronto Canada. This flight, on April 13, 1975, was the last to arrive in Canada. The children on this flight were not yet adopted. Last Airlift goes on to describe Tuyet's experience, leaving Vietnam and her new life with John and Dorothy Morris who adopted her into their family. Marsha Skrypuch intended to write Tuyet's story as a novel. Tuyet initially couldn't remember much of her early childhood, but as her memories resurfaced, Ms. Skrypuch decided to tell Tuyet's story instead.

The second book, One Step At A Time, tells about Tuyet's struggle to have her leg, damaged and weakened by polio mended so that she would be able to walk again. Tuyet's surgery took place at the newly opened McMaster University Hospital in Hamilton, ON in 1975. At this time, parents could not stay with their children, and there were no translation services available to a newcomer to Canada,  like Tuyet. Skrypuch effectively captures Tuyet's confusion and fear at being left alone in a hospital for a procedure she didn't understand.
Eventually Tuyet begins to adapt to her new home and family, largely due to having regained the ability to be mobile and also due to the loving care of the Morris family.

Tuyet's early attachment to John Morris is truly endearing. One family picture with Tuyet's arm draped over her father's knee suggests that Tuyet immediately formed a close bond with the man who was the first father she had ever known. Tuyet was very blessed to have been adopted into such a loving family. Her two younger sisters treated her with kindness and repeatedly reassure her. They introduced her to the strange, new customs of her adopted country, Canada.

These two books will serve as a gentle introduction for younger children to an event known as the Fall of Saigon and also the Vietnam War. Skrypuch's books can also be used as the jumping point for children learning about the Vietnamese refugees who came to Canada in the mid-1970's.

Book Details:
Last Airlift. A Vietnamese Orphan's Rescue from War by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
One Step at a Time: A Vietnamese Child Finds Her Way
Pajama Press