Review by Booklist Review
Every year, more and more species are deemed endangered, due in large part to human activities that threaten them. Cotton's succinct, lyrical text invites readers to count and consider 10 vulnerable creatures, along with the qualities and behaviors that make them worthy of our protection. She spotlights lions, gorillas, giraffes, tigers, elephants, Ethiopian wolves, penguins, sea turtles, macaws, and zebras, reminding readers of their everyday struggles for survival. Walton's photo-realistic charcoal portraits are exquisitely rendered, and the decision to depict several from a head-on perspective ensures that readers will make direct eye contact and empathize with these creatures. Introduced by Virginia McKenna (of the Born Free Foundation) and appended with notes on the animals and additional resources, this handsome offering makes an excellent introduction to this topic. Pair with Patricia Mullins' V for Vanishing: An Alphabet of Endangered Animals (1994) or Anne Bowman's Count Them While You Can (2011) for an Earth Day story hour.--Weisman, Kay Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Arresting charcoal portraits of endangered animals, drawn in near-photographic detail, command attention in this counting book, which begins with "one lion" and ends with "ten zebras." The large-scale b&w images are set against white backgrounds and paired with poems printed in a bright orange suggestive of the threats the animals face. Cotton's pensive, unrhymed works describe the animals' behaviors, physical attributes, and beauty: "Five elephants travel the dusty paths of memory./ From the day of their birth, the babies walk./ They walk into adulthood and beyond,/ following the paths set by their mothers before them." Several poems also touch on the diminishing numbers of the species: "Does she know they are too few?/ What future is there for/ these four fighters?/ Four tigers." Endnotes offering information about the animals and their endangered statuses conclude this powerful tribute to vulnerable creatures. All ages. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 2-This oversize counting book features 10 endangered animals drawn beautifully in charcoal. The images of lions, tigers, elephants, penguins, and more are so detailed that they appear on first look to be black-and-white photos. Each spread presents an animal, such as a single male lion, two gorillas, three giraffes, etc. Soft, moody text printed in orange accompanies the images. "One lion sits and watches his rough-and-tumble pride. He surveys the golden savanna, and a flicker catches his eye-something moving in the grass." "Four tigers rest in dappled shade. The mother raises her magnificent head. She is a warrior of the forest, heavily muscled, a flash of fire and night that brings oblivion to her prey." The end pages expand upon the status of the animals, from the endangered to those less threatened. Their general habitat is noted along with information regarding the number of the species now left. VERDICT A stunning portrait of beautiful creatures in a book with a strong environmental message.-Roxanne Burg, Orange County Public Library, CA © Copyright 2015. 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
This oversize book features startlingly realistic charcoal illustrations of ten endangered species. The accompanying free-verse poems celebrate each threatened animal and provide some information about behavior or habitat. Back matter includes additional information about the protection status of each animal, sounding a sobering alarm about extinction while expressing hope for population recovery. Websites. (c) Copyright 2016. 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.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
This oversized book consists of 10 double-page spreads counting up from one lion to 10 zebras. The photorealistic drawings are breathtakingly beautiful, deserving of their large space. The text, all printed in orange ink, consists of the numbers spelled out and short, poetic passages describing each species, and it is nicely set as free-verse lines rather than less attractive paragraphs. For example: "Three giraffes / with their heads in the sky / pluck leaves from trees and chew, / up and down, side to side, / for up to twenty hours a day. / They are peaceful patterned giants / wandering from place to place, / sleepless surveyors of the grasslands. / Three wanderers. / Three giraffes." The foreword by Virginia McKenna contains a sobering reminder of the reality of vanishing species, and backmatter gives further information, including protection status, without defining the terms. (Is it best to be "vulnerable" or "endangered" or "near threatened"?) Pitching the book to an all-ages audience is a bit disingenuous, as the book lacks numerals and thick stock for the youngest viewers, and the text is soundly in the realm of middle-graders. A large part of its allure relies on its large size and the conscientious design of the pages. It's beautifully executed, but it will be a devil to shelve, and it's hard to see many families adopting it for the coffee table. (Informational picture book. 4-10) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
