by Lita Judge
Roaring Brook Press, 2013. Unpaged. Nonfiction.
Most of us think of dinosaurs as having been enormous creatures who could squish you with a step, had you been around at the time. Lita Judge's delightful new book talks about the big ones, but also describes dinosaurs of all sizes, in terms of modern animals that children will know. The Microraptor, for instance, "was a deadly hunter, but he would barely be able to look a modern-day chicken in the eye." The dreaded velociraptor, of Jurassic Park fame, was only about the size of a medium-sized dog--say, a Labrador--and could have been taken for a walk if you could find a leash that would keep him from biting your kneecaps off. Judge polishes off the dinosaur world with Argentinosaurus, as long as four school buses and weighing more than seventeen elephants, "probably the biggest animal ever to walk on land." The genius of Judge's book lies in her attractive pictures and the textual and graphic comparisons that will help kids really understand the sizes of dinosaurs. Well done!
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