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 - Dorothea's Eyes by Barb Rosenstock

Illustrated by Gerard DuBois

2016 Calkins Creed, Honesdale, PA (an Imprint of Highlights)

HC $16.99

32 pgs.

Goodreads rating:  4.11 - 167 ratings

My rating:  4

Endpapers:  large dotted background with the same camera-on-legs repeated over and over

Dedications:  "For my grandfather - BR"
     "For my sister, with love - GD"

1^st line/s:  "Dorothea opens her grey-green eyes.  They are special eyes.  They see what others miss."

My comments:  Nice introduction for kids of the life of Dorothea Lange - what drove her and the type of photos she took.  It touches upon the developing of them, but I wish this had been mentioned, and explained, a bit more to help inform our kids in this digital age.  Although prone to sickness and always dealing with the polio she endured as a child, she is an active photographer in the streets and fields of the Depression.  At the end of the book there is a sampling of six of her photos - including "Migrant Mother."  An afterword, selected bibliography and two-page timeline are added touches at the end of the book.  A great model for researching and teaching.

Goodreads:  After a childhood bout of polio left her with a limp, all Dorothea Lange wanted to do was disappear. But this desire not to be seen helped her learn how to blend into the background and observe others acutely. With a passion for the artistic life, and in spite of her family’s disapproval, Dorothea pursued her dream to become a photographer and focused her lens on the previously unseen victims of the Great Depression. This poetic biography tells the emotional story of Lange’s evolution as one of the founders of documentary photography. It includes a gallery of Lange’s photographs, and an author’s note, timeline, and bibliography.

Write On, Mercy! – Gretchen Woelfle

The Secret Life of Mercy Otis Warren

Illustrated by Alexandra Wallner

2012, Calkins Creek, Honesdale, PA

Rating:  5

For:  older kids, probably not preschool

40 pages

HC $16.95

Endpapers:  Orange

Title Page:  Mercy’s arm and hand, with quill and melting candle, writing on a stack of papers.

Setting:  Late 1700’s during the American Revolution, in Massachusetts

1^st line/lines:  “From her parlor window in West Barnstable,  young Mercy Otis could watch the tide flow in and out of the Great Marsh on Cape Cod Bay.”

OSS:  Tells the life of Mercy Otis Warren, a woman who told the story of the Revolution in over 1,000 pages that took thirty years.  She would have been a politician if she had lived in contemporary times!

This was an exceptionally fine story about a really interesting person – of the female persuasion – in our history.  The writing is beautiful and sophisticated, the story well-researched and finely told.  A keeper.  Perfect for my 4^th grade biography unit.

Includes Author’s Note, a painting of Mercy Otis Warren by John Singleton Copley (this REALLY makes her a real person for the kids), a 2-page timeline of her life and what was going on politically, an excellent bibliography, and a number of websites.  What a perfect model for a well researched book of history to share with kids! 

Bravo!

About the author:  Woelfe is a writer from LA who loves history, especially stories of little-known people in history.  She’s written Katie the Windmill Cat, All the World’s a Stage: A Novel in Five Acts, and Jeannette Rankin: Political Pioneer.

The illustrator, also a love of history, lives in Yucatan, Mexico.