Wow! This book is fabulous! Just like it’s companion book, “Mirror Mirror,” this book is a series of Reverso poems based on fairy tales, some obvious and familiar, others more obscure.  Reverso poems are two side-by-side poems that use the exact same words, but by reversing the order in which the lines are written and changing punctuation, they completely alter the meaning of the text (often reversing the meaning entirely).  I was grateful for the paragraphs in the back which offer brief synopses of the fairy tales on which the poems are based, as some were unfamiliar to me.  The illustrations and bright and eye-catching and really contribute to setting the two poems against each other. I think this kind of play with words would have applications at all age-levels.  A treat!

Large sized, nonfiction book, with quality photographs make this book about alligators, a winner.   Basic information about habitat, birth cycle, and thankfully a world map locating them on our planet, and included in this book.  In the back an index, glossary, and Fact Hound internet sites exist.  In visiting this site, there was age relevant additional information about this animal.  This is a really nice extension for students wising to research more information about this animal.

Recommended for elementary  libraries.

Very Large photographs make this book a great addition to a library.   This would make a good read out-loud book, shared with a whole group.  The book is organized to be read as an interactive game.  The picture of an animal’s habitat on one side, and four photos of animals on the other.  There is a hint to help the reader (s) guess which animal lives there.

This would make a great support book for a science unit on animal habitats.

ARG! Most definitely NOT recommended.  I’m not even sure I want to put it in my library.  It does have some nice features – great photos, a consistent layout, basic information outlined for struggling readers, with extra information added for those interested & ready to read a bit more.  I was almost ready to forgive it for being guilty of my biggest pet peeve with books written for early readers — when in their efforts to keep the text simple they oversimplify to the point of inaccuracy.  On the page about macaque monkeys, it states that, “During the winter, they warm up in hot springs.”  While this is certainly what is depicted in the photo chosen for the book, it cannot be said of all macaque monkeys, as they don’t all live where there is winter, let along where there are hot springs near by.  Then they compounded their mistake by putting a true/false quiz in the back, designed to test students’ comprehension of their reading, when they come right out and ask students whether it is true or false that, “Macaque monkeys warm up in hot springs.” Of course, their answer key declares this to be a true statement, even though it’s not necessarily so. Ugh!

Given that it’s trying to cover the animals, weather, industry and landscape of an entire (and very diverse) continent in only a few simple sentences per page, it doesn’t do a bad job.  I only found one place to object to it’s oversimplification: when the sentence, “Other people live in villages,” is immediately followed by, “They grow rice on farms,” it implies that all villagers are farmers, which of course is not accurate.  But over-all not bad, just basic.

It’s a decent little book: sturdy binding, nice full-page color photos, solid information in clear sentences.  But with it’s limited scope (32 pages, with just a couple easy sentences per page), trying to cover a vast topic like an entire continent means it’s only very basic, generalized information.  The photos don’t always do as good a job of supporting the text as I would like, either (e.g. text says that lions, giraffes, and zebras live in Africa, but accompanying photo shows only zebras).  Still, not bad.

The title says it’s “A Day with Mail Carriers,” but it’s really only about half about what the mail carriers are doing, and the rest is about the people sending and receiving the mail.  To be true to it’s title, I wish it had told more about what happens at the post office, and about different types of mail carriers.

If I had looked closer at what I was getting I wouldn’t have even taken these for free — they’re completely not suited to library use.  I know the kids like the transparent pages, and though not sturdy the regular ones are fine.  But these transparent pages are in front of black pages, so that the only way the reader can view what’s on them is by sliding a punch-out “torchlight” behind them (a piece of paper with a white “spotlight” to illuminate small portions of the illustrations at a time).  It’s gimmicky, and there’s no way the punch-out torch will last more than a month before getting lost.

If I had looked closer at what I was getting I wouldn’t have even taken these for free — they’re completely not suited to library use.  I know the kids like the transparent pages, and though not sturdy the regular ones are fine.  But these transparent pages are in front of black pages, so that the only way the reader can view what’s on them is by sliding a punch-out “torchlight” behind them (a piece of paper with a white “spotlight” to illuminate small portions of the illustrations at a time).  It’s gimmicky, and there’s no way the punch-out torch will last more than a month before getting lost.

Kids love the transparent pages, but they’re a bit fragile for library use.  I won’t expect these to last long.  Also, because the topic is so broad, the depth of information is rather shallow.