Biggest, Strongest, Fastest - Softcover

Ages 4-9. Beautiful double-page-spread cut-paper collages illustrate a picture book about "some of the biggest and smallest, fastest and slowest, strongest and longest" record holders in the animal world. The facts are amazing. Their juxtaposition makes you gasp, not just about size and speed but about comparative wonders. Right after the African elephant, which eats more than 300 pounds of grass and leaves every day, there's a close-up two-page picture of an ant, which turns out to be the strongest animal for its size: it can carry five times its own weight. The book's design makes it accessible at many levels. The youngest can identify the various creatures. Preschoolers can enjoy the one-sentence descriptions in large type ("The cheetah can run faster than any other animal. . . . The flea is very small, but it is the world's best jumper"). Older kids will love thinking about the additional facts regarding scale and proportion that are printed in small type, accompanied by a tiny silhouette in the corner of each picture ("If a 5 1/2-foot-tall woman could jump as well as a flea, she could leap to the top of a 65-story building"). Here's proof that power isn't just about size and that science can be a lot of fun. Hazel Rochman