Animal Lives: Elephants by Sally Morgan
The eye-catching image on the cover of this glossy picture book certainly encourages young readers to pick it up and start reading. Two cute baby elephants gaze confidently into the camera lens whilst sharing a trunkful of lush green vegetation. There is just something about baby elephants, isn't there? Who could resist opening the book for a closer look? Full review...
Animal Lives: Cheetahs by Sally Morgan
The first thing that struck me about this book was the excellent use of visuals. Most of the photographs in the book are for a double page spread. The images are crisp and clear and provide a great close-up view of these beautiful cats. Using the photograph as a centrepiece, each two-page section examines a different aspect of cheetah behaviour. Subjects covered include growing up, hunting, territory and cheetahs under threat. The sections have a brief introductory paragraph in large, bold print and then several smaller facts surround the main picture, sometimes including smaller photographs to illustrate the main points. Full review...
The Bee: A Natural History by Noah Wilson-Rich
Bees have been making a bit of a media splash of late, due to heightened concern about their declining numbers and general welfare. Governments have been urged to do more to protect these important creatures, with a recent EU ban on neonicotinoid pesticides hailed as a 'victory for bees'. There is no doubt that these prolific pollinators are a vital part of our ecosystem, and the human fascination with bees goes back to our ancient history. But just why do we find these hardworking insects so fascinating? Full review...
My Gentle Barn: where animals heal and children learn to hope by Ellie Laks
As a child Ellie Laks was abused, but not only did she suffer at the hands of her abuser, she also had to endure parental indifference to what was happening to her. Her only relief came through animals - and even then she had to cope when the animals were taken from her. As an adult she discovered that she had a real talent for healing animals - and that they helped her to heal too. In a brilliant leap of intuition she realised that if the animals could help her to heal they could do the same for others and so the Gentle Barn was born - a place where animals were brought as a place of safety and where disadvantaged children and special needs groups could use as therapy. Full review...
Hummingbirds: A Life-Size Guide to Every Species by Michael Fogden, Marianne Taylor and Sheri L Williamson
I've always been fascinated by hummingbirds - delicate, colourful, beautifully and brilliantly adapted to extract nectar from flowers. Perhaps most of all for me it's their acrobatic flight - the ability to hover and manoeuvre which has me hooked: I could watch them for hours, amazed that birds whose weight can only meaningfully be given in ounces can do so much. I was drawn to this book as soon as I saw it, for a number of reasons. Full review...
Beautiful Owls: Portraits of Arresting Species from Around the World by Marianne Taylor and Andrew Perris
Owls are strange birds: because they're crepuscular and twilight isn't the best time for seeing birds with any clarity they tend to be the stuff of legend and we don't know as much about them as we might. On the other hand, they're the most recognisable of birds, perhaps because of the forward-facing eyes and would look almost human if it was not for that uncanny ability to swivel the neck to almost 360°. Marianne Taylor has gone some way towards correcting this lack of knowledge in Beautiful Owls. She gives us an overview of the species, traces them back to the earliest civilisations and shows their evolution. Full review...
Little Lost Hedgehog (RSPCA Fiction) by Jill Hucklesby
Grace Fallon was out in her garden one evening, doing what she did every night - making certain that her pet rabbits were fed, watered and safe. When she saw a movement in the flower bed she went to investigate and found a baby hedgehog - or a hoglet as they're correctly called. Wisely she didn't attempt to touch the animal but told her parents and then kept watch from inside the house. When the hoglet reappeared and looked rather distressed her mother rang the RSPCA and was told to give it some food - dog food and crushed dog biscuits (NEVER milk as it can make any hog very sick). Later someone from the RSPCA came round to collect the hoglet and take it to their centre for care. Full review...
How to be a BAD Birdwatcher by Simon Barnes
Look out of the window.
See a bird
Enjoy it.
Congratulations. You are now a birdwatcher.
Full review...
Archie the Guide Dog Puppy: Hero in Training by Sam Hay
I don't often pick up a non-fiction book for the 7+ age group, find it riveting reading and informative about a subject with which I'm already familiar, but that was the case with Archie: Hero in Training. Archie is a puppy destined to be a guide dog for a blind person and he's just one story in a book about the pups-in-training, the working dogs, the adults who have guide dogs, or struggle to learn the techniques - or even what happens to the dogs who don't turn out to be what's needed. There's a full range as well as information about what a guide dog costs - and it's not cheap! Full review...
Pig in the Middle by Matt Whyman
I'm so pleased I read this book. It's only the occasional writer who grabs me by the short and curlies with his observation of human nature, but accomplished children's writer Matt Whyman not only grabbed me, but sold me on the mini-pigs as well. Full review...
The Book of Deadly Animals by Gordon Grice
Animals and humans have long mixed, even though the one has almost always proven capable of being lethal to the other. Many scientists in the past decided animals killing humans were aberrant, and that the real animal knew it was second best to humans, having been saved in the Ark, and respected our dominion over them. Even now, it seems, there are opinions that creatures attacking mankind are somehow rogue and need destroying. But where is the wrong in an animal behaving as its nature compels it? Similarly, the human wandering around the wilderness, or even the idiot woman feeding a black bear her own toddler's honey-dripping hand (true story - what the bear thought of the taste of honeyed fingers we don't know) is just the same in reverse - humans behaving as only humans can. Full review...