Poem: Stegosaurus by David Elliott

Stegosaurus

Your brain?

The size

of a

walnut.

Your bulk?

Immense.

Which proves

there’s some-

thing more

to life

than just

intelligence.

                        David Elliott

Picture Book: Explorers by Mathew Cordell

A Wordless Picture Book
Illustrated by the author

2019 Feiwel and Friends

HC $18.99

40 pgs.

Goodreads rating:  3.75 - 177 ratings

My rating:  4
Endpapers: bright rust

1^st line/s:  None- it's a wordless book

My comments:  Fun story, lots to examine, with a great message and a little bit of "mysticism."  The young boy is given a flying airplane-type toy and he  plays with it throughout the museum, until it's caught by another boy.  At first he's upset, but when he "loses" his parents, upon finding them, both families make friends. 

Goodreads: From Caldecott Medalist Matthew Cordell, Explorers is a new picture book about an extraordinary trip to a museum.
          When a family goes to a local museum, a boy notices a homeless man sitting outside, making brightly colored origami birds. He convinces his dad to buy a bird the man makes just for him.
          Once inside the museum, his little sister takes the bird and launches it into the air. Is it lost? Soon another boy helps him look, and the paper bird brings two families―and two new friends―together.
          With the style he used in Wolf in the Snow, Matthew Cordell shows how an ordinary family outing can be both extraordinary and magical.

PICTURE BOOK - We Don't Eat Our Classmates by Ryan T. Higgins

Illustrated by the author

2018, Disney/Hyperion

HC $17.99

40 pgs.

Goodreads rating:  4.51 - 3829 ratings

My rating:  5
Endpapers:  drawings of dinosaurs drawn by Penelope's classmates

1^st line/s:  "Penelope Rex was nervous.  It's not every day a little T. rex Starts school."

My comments:  This has been my favorite book so far this year (it was written last year, 2018)  It's funny, creative, and has a fantastic theme:  treating each other fairly, lovingly, appropriately.  I can't wait to read this aloud to kids.  And I love the illustrations, the diversity in the classroom, and Penelope's innocent reactions to everything that happens to her.

Goodreads:  Penelope the dinosaur starts school, but it’s hard to make friends when her classmates are so delicious!
          It’s the first day of school for Penelope Rex, and she can’t wait to meet her classmates. But it’s hard to make human friends when they’re so darn delicious! That is, until Penelope gets a taste of her own medicine and finds she may not be at the top of the food chain after all. . . . Readers will gobble up this hilarious new story from award-winning author-illustrator Ryan T. Higgins.

MOVIE - Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

PG-13 (2:09)

Wide release 6/22/18

Viewed July 5, 2018

RT Critic:  48  Audience:  51
Critic's Consensus:  Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom adds another set piece-packed entry to the blockbuster franchise, although genuinely thrilling moments are in increasingly short supply.

Cag:  3 liked it okay...

Directed by J. A. Bayona

Universal Pictures

Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard

My comments:  EArly afternoon showing to get out of the heat - I haven't seen any of the other Jurassic Parks leading up to this, which is just fine with me.  I like Chris Pratt and it was a pretty interesting storyline for an action/adventure.  The good guys versus the bad guys, and of course they are VERY bad guys.  It was a bit slow and draggy in places.  Midling entertainment, nothing spectacular.

RT/ IMDb Summary:  It's been three years since theme park and luxury resort Jurassic World was destroyed by dinosaurs out of containment. Isla Nublar now sits abandoned by humans while the surviving dinosaurs fend for themselves in the jungles. When the island's dormant volcano begins roaring to life, Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) mount a campaign to rescue the remaining dinosaurs from this extinction-level event. Owen is driven to find Blue, his lead raptor who's still missing in the wild, and Claire has grown a respect for these creatures she now makes her mission. Arriving on the unstable island as lava begins raining down, their expedition uncovers a conspiracy that could return our entire planet to a perilous order not seen since prehistoric times.

PICTURE BOOK - In the Past by David Elliott

From Trilobites to Dinosaurs to Mammoths in More Than 500 Million Years
Illustrated by Matthew Trueman

2018, Candlewick Press

17.99 HC

40 pgs.

Goodreads rating:  3.75 - 20 ratings

My rating:5 all the way!

Endpapers: pale green solid

Illustrations are edge-of-page to edge-of-page, big, bold and wonderful, created with mixed media.

My comments:  What a superb book!!! I'm not disappointed that all the text is poetry, I'm giddy with happiness about it.  This book is many things....a timeline through the past (going waaaaay back), clever poetry of many styles, wonderfully informative and interesting facts, and it's gorgeous to look at!  What a great book for kids who like dinosaurs.  Highly recommended.

Trilobite (from the Cambrian Period; 544 - 505 million years ago)

So many of you.

So long ago.

So much above you.

Little below.

Now you lie hidden

deep in a clock,

uncountable ticks

silenced by rock

Brachytrachelopan (from the Jurassic Period; 208 - 144 million years ago)

Your neck too short!

Your tail too long!

Somehow you're

put together wrong.

And that name!

You should renounce it.

It takes a genius

to pronounce it.

Quetzalcoatlus (Cretaceous Period 144 - 65 million years ago)

Unrepentant.

Carnivore.

Largest of all

flying things.

How the timid

must have trembled

in the shadow

of your wings.

Titanoboa and Carbonemys (Paleogene Period; 60 - 24 million years ago)

The largest snake

that's lived on Earth,

you weighed a ton

(a three-foot girth),

your length not short

or marvelous.

And then there is Carbonemys,

with whom you shared a habitat.

It frightens me to think of that.

Goodreads:  Return to the prehistoric era and discover a host of creatures both novel and familiar, from the mysterious trilobite to the famed T. rex.
          Care to meet a dunkleosteus? An apatosaurus? How about the dragonflyesque meganaura? In a collection that's organized chronologically by epoch and is sure to intrigue everyone from armchair dino enthusiasts to budding paleontologists, David Elliott and Matthew Trueman illuminate some of the most fascinating creatures ever to evolve on the earth. Combining poems both enlightening and artful with illustrations perfect for poring over, this volume ensures fascinating trips back to a time as enthralling and variable as any in our planet's evolutionary history. 

PICTURE BOOK - Hattie & Hudson by Chris Van Dusen

Illustrated by the author

2017, Candlewick Press

40 pgs.

Goodreads rating: 3.82 - 173 ratings

My rating: 5

Endpapers:  All pale green - small island on a lovely lake/silhouettes

Illustrations:  Bright, bold, and completely covering most pages

1^st line/s:  "Haddie McFadden loved to explore.  Every morning after breakfast, she'd grab her life jacket, wave good-bye to her parents, and paddle out in the canoe to see what she could see."

My comments:  Chris VanDusen does it again! (I love his stuff.)  His illustrations amaze me - big and bold, covering the page from edge to edge.  Hudson is a "monster" who lives at the bottom of a quiet country lake.  (He looks more like a dinosaur to me.)  I can't wait to read it to my grandson - he's afraid to swim in fresh water, but LOVES the stories of Sasquatch and Bigfoot.  I'm betting he's going to love this.  And I like the end note that Mr. Van Dusen writes on the copyright page: "And to all the young explorers who will be spending time at a lake this summer: Remember, there are no such things as a lake monster.  They don't exist.  At least I've never seen one.  But I keep looking."

Goodreads:  A little girl and her colossal friend teach a monster-size lesson about prejudging others in a charming new offering from Chris Van Dusen. 
          Hattie McFadden is a born explorer. Every morning she grabs her life jacket and paddles out in her canoe to discover something new on the lake, singing a little song on her way. When her singing draws up from the depths a huge mysterious beast, everyone in town is terrified except Hattie, who looks into the creature's friendly, curious eyes and knows that this is no monster. So Hattie sneaks out at night to see the giant whom she names Hudson and the two become friends. But how can she make the frightened, hostile townspeople see that Hudson isn't scary or dangerous at all? 
          Chris Van Dusen brings his colorful, perspective-bending artwork to this satisfying new story about acceptance, friendship, and sticking up for those who are different.

Chalk - Bill Thomson

Marshall Cavendish, 2010
$15.99
40 pages
Rating: 5
Endpapers: Bright green

This is a wordless picture book that is SO beautifully illustrated! I'd love to see the words that kids would create to go with it!

Three kids are out walking through a playground in the rain. They find a shopping bag that holds pieces of colored chalk. When one kids grabs a yellow piece and draws a sun on the wet sidewalk, a sun rises to the sky, drying up the rain and wetness. When another kid grabs a peach chalk and draws butterflies, monarchs flutter up into the air. The third kid chooses a green one and draws the outline of a dinosaur. And suddenly they are overshadowed by a huge real one! They run, screaming, into the playground's slide tunnels. The kid grabs a blue chalk and, on the inside of the tunnel, draws a cloud and raindrops. As the rain starts falling, the dinosaur drips to nothingness.

Superb!

*Read this aloud and then give kids a piece of chalk.
*Write the story.
*Choose snazzy vers, adverbs, or adjectives to describe each page.

I'm Bad - Kate & Jim McMullan

For: Kids who really like dinosaurs
Published: 2008
Rating: 3
Read: Today at the library
Endpapers: a nine-patch of alternating rust & orange squares with illustrations of dinosaurs in black

Maybe because I'm not a dinosaur fan? For some reason the illustrations turn me off? Though the dialogue is fun and kid-friendly ("I'm REALLY BIG. 6-tons-of-MUSCLE on-the-hustle BIG"), it's almost blasted or shouted from the page. The dinosaur-- we never know what kind -- is prowling for prety. No white at all - crazy pictures using bright greens and yellows and rusty oranges ... there's even a fold-UP page when mom arrives. Probably 6-year-olds who love dinosaurs would love this book, but not many others, I'm guessing. Though I'm probably quite wrong....

Tadpole Rex - Kurt Cyrus

For: School-age kids
Published: 2008
Ratng: 3.5
Read: Nov. 1st, 2008
Endpapers: medium olive (both prehistoric AND froggy...)

A swamp is born in prehistoric dinosaurland, and in the swamp a puddle, and in the puddle a polliwog. Rex the poliwog. We watch him grow to be a full-fledged frog. Written in couplets, quite cleverly rhymed, the large 10 X 12 pages have no hint of white, only strong greens and swampy colors from edge to edge of the page. So many great greens! The illustrations are done on scratchboard and colored digitally - that sounds so modern and techy! I've no clue what they're talking about. Very sophisticated word choices....I'd certainly use it with my middle schoolers if the need for a prehistoric or frog study ever came up. A sample:

Primeval puddles were desperate places
Of ambush and panic and life-or-death chases