Two truths and a lie It's alive!

Ammi-Joan Paquette

Book - 2017

Did you know that there is a fungus that can control the mind of an ant and make it do its bidding? Would you believe there is such a thing as a corpse flower -- a ten-foot-tall plant with a blossom that smells like a zombie? How about a species of octopus that doesn't live in water but rather lurks in trees in the Pacific Northwest? Every story in this book is strange and astounding. But not all of them are real. Just like the old game in this book's title, two out of every three stories are completely true and one is an outright lie. Can you guess which? It's not going to be easy. Some false stories are based on truth, and some of the true stories are just plain unbelievable. And they're all accompanied by dozens of ph...otos, maps, and illustrations. Amaze yourself and trick your friends as you sort out the fakes from the facts!

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Subjects
Published
New York, NY : Walden Pond Press, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers [2017]
Language
English
Main Author
Ammi-Joan Paquette (author)
Other Authors
Laurie Ann Thompson (author)
Edition
First edition
Physical Description
x, 166 pages : illustrations (chiefly color) ; 24 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 136-153) and index.
ISBN
9780062418791
  • Introduction
  • Part 1. Preposterous Plants and Fungi-Crazy, Creepy, Cool
  • Chapter 1. Crazy Plants
  • A. Underground Miracle Root
  • B. Pandomonium
  • C. The Secret Lives of Plants
  • Chapter 2. Creepy Plants (and Fungi)
  • A. The Flowery Smell of Death
  • B. Eyes Watching from the Darkness
  • C. A Fungus among Us
  • Chapter 3. Cool Plants
  • A. Watch Your Step!
  • B. Let There Be Flower Power!
  • C. The Sweet Truth
  • Part 2. Astonishing Animals-Small, Medium, Large
  • Chapter 4. Small Animals
  • A. Puppy's Got a Brand-New Pal
  • B. The Tiny Guardians of Your Bookshelf
  • C. Mighty Mollusks
  • Chapter 5. Medium Animals
  • A. Invasion of the Tree Octopods
  • B. The Extraordinary, Extra-Cranial Life of Mike
  • C. Olmy Goodness, Tiny Dragons!
  • Chapter 6. Large Animals
  • A. Discovering Prehistoric Bambi
  • B. Megaconda-Myth No More
  • C. Gelatinous Curtain of Death
  • Part 3. How about Humans-Yes! Noooo. Maybe?
  • Chapter 7. Humans-Yes!
  • A. Poop to the Rescue
  • B. Frankenstein's Fix
  • C. Pee Power!
  • Chapter 8. Humans-Noooo.
  • A. A Brief History of the World in Hiccups
  • B. Me, Myself, and ... Who?
  • C. I Spy with My X-Ray Eyes
  • Chapter 9. Humans-Maybe?
  • A. The Cure for the Common Wallflower
  • B. The Bloody Fountain of Youth
  • C. Remote-Controlled ... Brains?!
  • Research Guide
  • Answer Guide
  • Bibliography
  • Photograph Credits
  • Index
Review by Booklist Review

*Starred Review* Considering the fresh attention being paid to teaching a skeptical approach to information evaluation, this series opener couldn't be better timed. Inspired by a parlor game, the authors mix two facts about an aspect of the natural world (plants, animals, and even humans) with one untruth, and invite readers to pick out the bogus entry from each trio. Which is fake: human head transplants, fecal transplantation, or pee-powered fuel cells? A dinosaur dubbed Bambiraptor, an 82-foot megaconda, or oceanic siphonophores (living snot) longer than blue whales? Well, readers will have to check the book to know for sure. Each entry includes specific (or at least plausible) scientific details, names of actual researchers, and, along with colorful graphic images, often even photographs (doctored or otherwise). Each group of three also features sidebar definitions, projects to try, or thorny scientific issues to ponder, and a secondary list of hard-to-credit facts, body parts, medical procedures, or other items each with an embedded ringer. Readers can check their guesses at the back, where generous source notes for all the nonspurious content offered leads to further study. A brief but savvy guide to responsible research methods adds further luster to this crowd-pleaser.--Peters, John Copyright 2017 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Each chapter of this highly entertaining volume, first in a series, recounts three hard-to-believe stories that revolve around plants, animals, or humans. But only two of them are true, leaving it to readers to identify the invented one. In one example, the choices include a tree-dwelling octopus, a headless chicken, or tiny, cave-dwelling dragons. Spoiler alert: there's no such thing as a tree octopus, though the authors' description of it is persuasive ("In the early 2000s, the tree octopus was on the verge of extinction, but a strong grassroots campaign by dedicated Pacific Northwest communities helped reverse that"). Color infographics and photographs-some real, others fabricated-blur the truth further (one photo in the aforementioned chapter shows a bald eagle in flight, with an octopus in its talons). Readers can also have fun finding the false entries in 10-item lists of dinosaur names, diseases, body parts, and more. The authors' casual tone should easily draw readers in, and activities at the end of each chapter underscore a key goal underneath all the fun: developing critical thinking skills. Ages 8-12. Authors' agent: Erin Murphy, Erin Murphy Literary. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review

Gr 4-7-The authors have essentially created a kid's version of the popular NPR program Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me (in which adults compete to determine which news story is false); however, in this case, the emphasis is on science rather than current events. There are nine chapters in total, each devoted to quirky stories related to a different topic (e.g., plants, animals, humans). Each chapter contains three tales: two true and one false. Readers are instructed to use their research skills in order to differentiate between fact and fiction, and to that end a "Research Guide" is included, offering tips such as how to evaluate Internet sources for authority, accuracy, and reliability. An "Answer Guide" explains which of the three stories in each chapter is false and why, and an extensive bibliography cites sources. Kid-friendly text and colorful sidebars and images combine to create an overall attention-grabbing effect. VERDICT Providing a framework from which to develop the tools necessary to think critically about information, this title is a fun and potentially useful curricular tool for teachers and librarians, as well as an entertaining read for tween science fans.-Ragan O'Malley, Saint Ann's School, Brooklyn © Copyright 2017. 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 Kirkus Book Review

With "fake news" now such a prominent topic of conversation, a book that asks readers to separate bizarre but true stories about nature from fake ones is quite timely. This is the first of a series that presents Ripley's Believe It or Not-type true stories about the natural world alongside Barnum-esque fabrications and challenges readers to discern the real from the fake. Two out of every three stories are completely true, and one is an outright lie. Some false stories are based on fact, and others are complete imagination. All the stories are accompanied by color photos, maps, and illustrations. Some of the strange but true subjects include fungus-infected zombie ants, book scorpions, and a chicken named Mike that lived for several years after being beheaded. The fabrications include a walking moss that feeds off decomposing animals, the worm-size African threadsnake that lives in the ears of wild dogs and consumes earwax, and the Amazon "megaconda." Unlike the bogus tree octopuses that supposedly inhabit trees in the Pacific Northwest, most of these invented phenomena are convincing and difficult to separate from the real. It is up to readers to sort out the fakes from the facts. Sound advice is given on how to seek and evaluate information online, and, for the impatient, the fakes are revealed in an appendix. An engaging, entertaining compendium that will inform and confound. (photos, maps, bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 8-12) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.