Review by Booklist Review
Arnold reteams with Caple for a look at prehistoric creatures that swam in the seas. The focus is on the Mesozoic period and its aquatic reptiles, including ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, and mosasaurs. The information about each animal varies. The diet and the birthing of ichthyosaurs are highlighted, while the physical characteristics and predatory habits of the plesiosaurs are center stage. Mosasaurs, which lived later in time than the others, were known as supreme predators. Throughout, other information is interwoven (e.g., a two-page spread on fossil-finder Mary Anning; another about a scientist putting a dinosaur head on a skeleton's tail instead of its neck). Sometimes these turns seem like an interruption, but they're always interesting. Natural-history artist Caple painstakingly re-creates the creatures Arnold introduces, but it is the undersea paintings, with the reptiles gliding through the water, that are most effective. A list of places to see ancient sea reptiles will whet appetites for more.--Cooper, Ilene Copyright 2007 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 3-6-More than 220 million years ago during the Triassic period, ichtyosaurs, plesiosaurs, and mosasaurs were the largest marine reptiles. Readers learn what is known about these massive creatures and how scientists are continually making new discoveries based on fossil remains throughout the world. Arnold points out that even the scientists' thought processes have changed over time as additional discoveries are made. Chapters include the diet of these early reptiles and body features, including their size, birth, known range, and period in which they died out. Museums that have displays of these marine reptiles and an extensive index are included. Caple keeps the watercolor paintings subtle and subdued with earth tones of blue, green, and brown softly portraying features of each creature. Arnold has taken an immense amount of data and organized it in an appealing format. This book has some meat to it.-Sandra Welzenbach, Villarreal Elementary School, San Antonio, TX (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
(Intermediate) Some impressive creatures inhabited the oceans while dinosaurs lived on land. Arnold interweaves data about three major groups -- ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, and mosasaurs -- with accounts of fossil finds and theoretical advances that helped paleontologists put together the facts upon which the book is based. These facts include just how big they may have been, what they may have eaten, and where sources of that fossil species are concentrated. The accounts include a profile of the famed Mary Anning, whose fossil finds in nineteenth-century England included several ichthyosaurs. Arnold's informative text is accompanied by Caple's finely detailed illustrations of the various creatures in action under the sea. From HORN BOOK, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
