GUTS: Revised Edition |
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REVIEWS:
NSTA (National Science Teachers Association)
Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students K-12 (2006)
Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students K-12 (2006)
[ Read more ]KIRKUS REVIEWS
Guts has a lot going for it. In addition to its charmingly pithy title, it’s decorated with any number of computer-enhanced Technicolor photographs of innards and bears the predominantly white-on-black design that is Simon’s trademark. It’s also written in standard…
Guts has a lot going for it. In addition to its charmingly pithy title, it's decorated with any number of computer-enhanced Technicolor photographs of innards and bears the predominantly white-on-black design that is Simon's trademark. It's also written in standard Simon prose: By now, the author has perfected the art of boiling down the complexities of science into a simple, declarative sequence that, in this case, leads readers from the mouth to the anus. Along the way, they will learn of the dizzying variety of glands and goos that go into the digestive process, as well as the many organs from the epiglottis to the appendix. While the text would almost certainly have been improved by a pronunciation guide (how many child readers will know exactly what to do with "chyme"?) and would definitely have been improved by a bibliography or list of added resources, it does its job as efficiently as its subject does. Simon's books remain blessedly free of distracting sidebars and other trendy bells and whistles, and that simplicity in itself may be one of the keys to his enduring success. (Nonfiction. 5-12)
[ Read more ]BOOKLIST, Hazel Rochman
[ Read more ]SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL, Sandra Welzenbach, Villarreal Elementary School, San Antonio, TX
[ Read more ]CHILDREN'S LITERATURE, Cindy L. Carolan
Just as a car uses gasoline, motor oil and other fluids, our bodies need water and food to operate. Generally, we put these things in our bodies and then forget about them. An amazing process is really just beginning with…
Just as a car uses gasoline, motor oil and other fluids, our bodies need water and food to operate. Generally, we put these things in our bodies and then forget about them. An amazing process is really just beginning with each bit of food, one that is examined in detail in this highly-educational and interesting book about the digestive system. So many questions posed by children are answered in a straightforward manner. For example, how is it that the hydrochloric acid, which is a gastric juice the helps to soften food, does not eat away the walls of our stomachs? The answer is that the stomach is lined with a coating of protective mucus that is replaced every three or four days. Each spread contains one page of text and one full page of photographs or illustrations, actual shots of the surface of the inside of a stomach, the esophagus covered in mucus and colored X-rays body parts such as the colon and the coiled-up loops of the small intestine. These representations are definitely for the science minded and not the fainthearted. The author has written more than 200 science books, many of which are award winning publications. Highly recommended.
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