Time Trekkers: Dinosaurs

Book by Kate Needham

Grade 3-5-Four children use a time machine to travel back to the Roman Empire and to the age of the dinosaurs. The information in Romans is too trivialized to use for homework assignments, and the presentation is not visually pleasing. In Dinosaurs, brief facts about different species and their habitats are provided. While careful paleontologists stress the difficulty of coming to definite conclusions, Needham does not hesitate to do so. Fossil evidence raises the possibility that Maiasaura cared for its young, but this cannot be proven beyond a doubt, as stated in the book. In addition, the reasons given for dinosaurs' extinction do not cover all current theories. In both titles, sidebars take the form of illustrations of a hand-held computer-"the gizmo"-and answer questions about science, places, people, history, and art. Both books have confusing layouts with too many "gizmos" per page and too many speech balloons for the time travelers' comments. The full-color, cartoonstyle art is flat and unlifelike. Unnecessary purchases.?Susan Pine, New York Public Library
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.