Synopsis
Describes how animals and vehicles move in different ways and at different speeds on land, in water, and in the air.
Jacki Vawter, Ph.D. - Children's Literature
Each of the four books in this series is devoted to form one of measuring: speed, length, height and mass. In this book, speed is examined in simple double page chapters, each titled with a range of miles per hour. The first chapter compares living things that move from 3 inches per hour to 5.5 miles per hour. The final chapter compares things that have speeds between 17,640 and 107,106 miles per hour. The reader progresses from an amoeba's speed to the speed of the fastest planet, Mercury. The text is clear and supports the multiple illustrations on each page, all of which are depicted moving from left to right. A graph on the bottom of all pages marks the continuous MPH speeds across the contents of the entire book. Speeds up to 150 MPH are put in human context so that animals famous for their speed can be compared to the speed of a racing cyclist and a windsurfer. We learn that a marathon runner is faster than a pig but not as fast as a sea trout. Frequent sidebars provide additional information pertinent to speed comparisons, such as the fastest land animals and water speed records. The book's layout is enhanced by light blue or lavender backgrounds which alternate per chapter and move in shading from dark to light from the bottom of the page to the top. Kilometers per hour are given in parentheses next to MPH. An index is the only back matter. The book will serve as an appropriate jumping off place for readers interested in exploring how animals, people or things manage to move as fast as they do. 2004, Blackbirch Press/The Gale Group, Ages 8 to 12.