Biomimicry

August 15, 2020
Full-page illustrations and informational text explore various inventions inspired by nature. Bright, minimalist art presents eye-catching patterns for readers while labored, unfocused paragraphs flit from one pop-science story to another. In one spread, colorful geckos crawl next to rolls of tape as the accompanying text notes that scientists studied gecko toe pads to create adhesives. The text doesn't take time to explain why or how these toe pads work, and though a single close-up image of them could communicate that concept, the illustration doesn't either. Even as both text and pictures eschew detail, the reading level is strangely high; words such as autonomous or precursor and phrases like hits the market feel better suited to a corporate presentation than a picture book for children. It's unclear whether much fact-checking was done; the book reports that whale hearts inspired Jorge Reynolds Pombo to invent the pacemaker in 1958, but other accounts indicate that John Hopps designed and built the first pacemaker in 1950, with no mention of whales. The "LED light bulbs" appearing next to glowing fireflies look suspiciously like incandescent bulbs with wire filaments. While there is adequate racial diversity in illustrations of humans, it's frustrating that the text names Isaac Newton and Leonardo da Vinci but refers generally to "Japanese scientists." Its lack of solid information will frustrate avid nonfiction readers, and its abstruse language will alienate reluctant ones. (Nonfiction. 8-10)

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