Written by Jon Richards
Illustrated by Ed Simkins
Owlkids Books, 2013. 32 pages. Nonfiction.
Planet Earth: The World in Infographics is jumping on the infographic bandwagon, by using modern graphics and brief facts to illustrate the bigger picture. What works about this book is it presents interesting, by-the-numbers data. The graphics are cool and colorful, and certainly eye-catching. This technique is a good choice for presenting knowledge on such processes as the water cycle. What doesn't work here is that it's hard to focus; the contents have no common connection (aside from being about Earth), and there is so much random information that it's hard to retain anything. I would like to see the great artwork supplemented with a narrative thread and photographs. Another direction the author/illustrator could take would be to teach kids how to create their own infographics, which would be useful for science projects or visual displays.
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