Category Archives: Ages 9 to 12

Stars and the Dust that Made Us – Raman Prinja ****

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This is, without doubt, one of the stronger members of the ‘The Universe Rocks’ series – helped by the fact that there are few more amazing topics than stars. In the book, young readers are taken through how stars are born, the life cycle of the Sun, different types of stars, the role of stars in making the other elements from hydrogen, and the final destinations of stars, including, of course, neutron stars and black holes. There’s some really meaty material here and though Raman Prinja does sometimes leave out the best bits, there’s enough to real grab the imagination and inspire a young astronomer.

What is also good is that the activities are quite strong and well focussed on the subject. We have had complaints with some of the other books in the series that creaky old science projects (like the dreaded baking powder and vinegar volcano) are hauled out of the closet to pad out a book where it’s difficult to produce appropriate activities, but in this title the activities are spot on. We are invited to make an experiment to simulate why the stars twinkle, we do an ingenious experiment with a table tennis ball and a tennis ball to see a kind of shock wave in action, and we take a look at the stars themselves to perform a survey and make up our own constellations. Excellent.

There are a few quibbles. The whole series is too dark and low contrast. It’s always a problem with illustrated books on space – the publisher can’t resist the temptation of using a black background for many of the pages, but the result is a rather murky visual style. I also did think there were some good bits missed. No reference to the role of quantum tunnelling in fusion in the Sun, for instance, and it’s not made clear enough that stars can’t go beyond iron in producing elements without the help of a supernova. Similarly I would have liked to have seen not just why stars twinkle, but why planets don’t. But there is plenty to enjoy.

Overall, a good introduction to stars and nucleosynthesis for the young reader that is definitely recommended.

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Review by Brian Clegg

To the Planets and Beyond – Raman Prinja ***

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Another in the ‘The Universe Rocks’ series of slim illustrated astronomy/cosmology books for children, this is a guide to the planets, where they came from and what’s out there around other stars.

Generally speaking a good addition to the series, with some good solid content, though I’m not sure that the two page spread on volcanoes really deserves to be there except to justify having that science fair classic, the baking soda and vinegar volcano as one of the four activity pages. Let’s face it, there’s a limit to the activities you can do when you are dealing with planets.

I was also less than overwhelmed by the activity of making a sun dial – not because there’s anything wrong with it as an activity, but rather because it’s stretching things to make it have a lot to do with planets. The best of the activities by far was unrolling 90 sheets of toilet roll and using this as a scale model of the solar system. This really was a fun and original suggestion.

Plenty of reasonable content, then (though the overall feel, as with many of the books in this series was rather too dark and muddy in appearance), but not the most inspiring of the books.

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Review by Jo Reed

Galaxies and the Runaway Universe – Raman Prinja ****

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Cosmology might seem a heavy subject to hit children at the top of primary school/starting secondary school, which the level of the text in this smart looking (if rather darkly shaded) book suggests. But that would be wrong – they love stuff about space and the universe, and Raman Prinja gives it to them wholesale.

There really is a lot of material here considering it’s a slim 32 pages. We cover the Milky Way, galaxies, the big bang, the expanding universe, dark matter/energy and the fate of the universe in a series of well written and thoughtful two page spreads with plenty of illustrations (if, as already mentioned, it can be a bit murky). There are also some activities, though there are limitations to what you can do experimentally with galaxies and the universe, so these aren’t overwhelmingly exciting (two out of four are different ways to make spiral patterns).

This is very close to being a five star book. The only things that held me off is that there could have been a bit more fun detail. So, for instance, one of the better activities is using a balloon to model the expanding universe. Good stuff. But Raman Prinja doesn’t point out the bit that usually gets kids going, which is that the big bang happened right here in front of our nose, because when you squish that balloon up, every point in the universe is in the big bang. We are sweepingly told that three quarters of the universe is dark energy – but there is no explanation of the bit kids always query: how come we are treating energy as stuff? And there is at least one historical error: we are told ‘Almost 2000 years ago the ancient Greeks thought the Earth was at the centre [of the universe].’ Unfortunately the ancient Greeks no longer existed per se 2000 years ago.

Good stuff, though, and recommended for that 9-12 age group.

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Review by Jo Reed

Science Experiments – Ian Graham, Robert Winston ****

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This is a brilliant collection of DIY experiments for young scientists – but I had a real mental battle reviewing it. There is one thing about it I absolutely hate, for which I would give it just one star if the website’s reviewing system allowed me – but the fact is, horrible though this aspect is, it’s an excellent book and it deserves those four stars, but with a real boo hiss for the dubious behaviour of Robert Winston and the publisher as described later.

Let’s do the good part first, though. The book itself. Unlike most Dorling Kindersley publications many of the highly illustrated colourful pages are single page articles, though some stretch to a double spread. We get the whole gamut of DIY home experiments here. Some are fairly straightforward and predictable, like making water vapour or growing crystals, but others have a touch of brilliance about them in clever things I’ve never seen before. How about using a bike wheel as a centrifuge by attaching a container to the spokes? Genius!

The book is aimed at a relatively young audience, so it doesn’t have the more dramatic, exciting (and frankly dangerous) types of experiment described in The Ultimate Book of Saturday Science, but there is plenty in here to keep the most enthusiastic young scientist busy. We have chemistry, biology and physics, balloon hovercrafts and electroplating, solar ovens and metal detectors. Each of the experiments is very clearly described with the brilliant level of illustration you expect from DK. All in all an excellent essential for the young home experimenter.

So why did I get so worked up? Look at the cover. This is a book by Robert Winston. It even has his picture on the cover. Yet as I read through those experiments I thought ‘Robert Winston would not have spent his time doing this. Someone else wrote it.’ And sure enough, in small print in the acknowledgements, we see that it was actually written by Ian Graham. All Robert Winston did was write a couple of introductory paragraphs. This is absolutely shameful.

However, for Ian Graham’s sake, don’t let it put you off the book. Buy it despite Robert Winston. Because it is excellent.

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Review by Jo Reed

Algebra and Geometry – Dan Green & Basher ***

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Part of quite a large series rather worryingly called ‘Basher Science’, Algebra & Geometry is an illustrated book, with each two page spread having a text introduction to a concept on the left page, and a full page illustration that rarely seems to add any useful information on the right. Books in this series come in two size, pocket ones around 13cm square and larger format at just under 18cm square. This is one of the larger format.

The illustration style, which you can gather from the cover, you will either love or hate. I hate. As an example of how little they add, the illustration for a function shows a smiley toaster, popping out a pair of slices of toast that have curves on them. Hmm. That explains what a function is.

As for the text, it has one hugely irritating aspect, in that each spread introduces a concept voiced by that concept, in what seems an attempt to be cool. So, for instance, ‘Even number’s entry begins ‘Hey there. I’m Mr Trustworthy, the honest guy, the good cop.’ Groan. This is a shame, because there is a fair amount of valuable information in the text, it’s just rather cringe-making in format. The text has a few bullets at the bottom giving interesting factual or historical context and the main text tells us quite a lot about the concept being covered, but often the need to force what’s being said into the straight jacket of a character makes it unnecessarily obscure.

There’s a poster at the back, which shows a calculator with the buttons containing miniature versions of some of the illustrations, but I can’t see what value this has.

Overall, the format just hugely gets in the way. Disappointing.

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Review by Jo Reed

Plagues Pox and Pestilence – Richard Platt ****

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This large format hardback has all the gusto of a Horrible Science title in taking on disease – specifically the illnesses caused by protists, bacteria and viruses - and making it rather fun. The layout is very much Dorling Kindersley style with large two page spreads, busy with information, but John Kelly’s detailed (if occasionally murky) illustrations bring out much more of a fun side you might think there would be a struggle to incorporate in a title like this.

On the whole it’s hard to argue about the detailed and interesting contents. As well as meeting plenty of individual bugs we take in the way they travel and the  great pandemics, ways of stopping them, theories of disease and more. Sometimes we’re presented with quite a high level overview, like ‘Death in the air’ on diseases carried by mosquitos and the like – at others we dive in to quite a lot of detail, with a spread on John Snow and the Broad Street pump and its deadly dose of cholera.

I think the book’s biggest weakness is the lack of structure – it seems to dart from one thing to another with very little idea of ordered progression. I was also a little disappointed with its dealing with viruses. We are told, for example, that viruses ‘are not alive. To reproduce, they invade tiny body cells…’ but hang on there. How can something not alive do something like ‘invade’ or ‘reproduce’? Richard Platt could have taken a step back and given us a rather less pat view of what a virus is and how it works.

However these are relatively minor concerns in what is a very enjoyable read with lots of detail to discover on every page. Excellent pestilent fun.

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Review by Brian Clegg

Out Of This World – Clive Gifford ****

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This rather handsome little hardback has the right feel for a next generation popular science book for young readers. It still has the fun and illustrations of something like the Horrible Science series, but it feels more modern (and robust), more of today than the sort of frozen-in-time culture of the Beano that pervades the ‘Horrible’ books. Having said that I wish they hadn’t used the really old fashioned, early Tomorrow’s World ‘hi-tech’ font for the section titles.

We start from the Earth and take a tour outwards in the solar system and the universe, following up with the inevitable stuff on telescopes, space travel and a touch of cosmology. It’s all fine, with lots and lots of content. The only thing really that has been omitted is picking up more on the fun side that comes out of Horrible Science. I missed both the humour (even though I’d prefer it to be a bit more modern) and the personal touch. There wasn’t enough about the personalities in this book – it’s all fact, fact, fact.

As is often the case with a book like this, the physics is just a touch weaker than the  astronomy. Mostly it’s not too bad, but when talking about gravity, for example, I would have liked to have seen a little bit on general relativity – it’s easy enough to make it approachable to this age group – and the explanation of microgravity on a space station is misleading it suggests the pull of gravity is practically zero, where actually it’s around 90% Earth normal, it’s just that astronauts are weightless because they are falling.

Overall, then, a good solid book on astronomy, space and cosmology, but one that isn’t going to set the world on fire.

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Review by Brian Clegg

Earthquakes and Volcanoes – Anita Ganeri ****

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Geology is a bit of a difficult subject to get younger readers interested in. When you’ve seen one rock, you’ve seen them all. (I know this isn’t true, but the distinctions rapidly become only of interest to the geeky.) But you can’t go wrong with things that explode and/or open huge cracks in the Earth and spew out molten lava. Cue earthquakes and volcanoes.

What’s good about this approach is that the book draws the reader in, but then can get in plenty of geological and Earth sciences facts that otherwise might never have been bothered with. The book has a number of dramatic popups – I particularly liked Krakatoa exploding, which portrays a huge jet of ash and fire spewing from the middle of the book – plus several other different types of paper technology, which range from simple turn the flap examples and mini-booklets on the page to a wheel you turn to see different strengths of eruption.

On the whole this all worked well. The paper technology was slightly lower key than some other books of this kind I’ve seen – and I struggled to turn the flap that lets you see inside a volcano (memo to self: stop biting nails), but it certainly enhanced what was an impressively visual experience.

There’s no doubt a young reader will come away from this book knowing more about what earthquakes and volcanoes are, how they happen, what impact they have on us and the planet and what particular examples have stood out in history. All the expected favourites are there from Vesuvius covering Pompeii to the San Francisco earthquake (with a dramatic, diorama style popup).

The only reason this book doesn’t get five stars is that it seems just a bit too bitty – it lacks structure through the book – throwing facts at us well, but not providing any real narrative.

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Review by Jo Reed

Mission to the Moon – Alan Dyer ****

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It’s interesting to compare this book with the more briefly titled Moon – where that title has a whole slew of bits of information on the Moon in history, myth and legend, as well as the exploration, this book is much more strongly focussed on the Apollo programme. It does have a few background spreads on our historical view of our satellite, plus early space ventures, but the focus is very much on those manned missions. This isn’t a bad thing at all – it gives the book a useful focus.

Unlike many large format illustrated books, this clearly isn’t a Dorling Kindersley clone – it may still be dependent on two page spreads, but there is a quite a different feel. In fact stylistically it is rather old fashioned, reminding me of nothing more than the non-fiction pages that you see in reproductions of the Eagle comic with their cutaways and earnest content. This isn’t a bad thing – you get the feel for a book about the Moon landings that very much fits with the period.

It’s a bit of a fan book in many ways. There is loving detail about the seconds before takeoff, mission details and more. It’s a book to immerse yourself in the Apollo missions for the young would-be astronaut who fancies something more challenging than a trip to the space station.

Although the design is (presumably deliberately) dated, there are a couple of up-to-the-minute features with a 40th anniversary (okay, up to the minute a few years ago) Moon landing poster, and a DVD to watch. All in all, a package for a lover of NASA rather than astronomy, but good nonetheless.

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Review by Jo Reed

What’s Science All About? – Alex Frith, Hazel Maskell, Lisa Jane Gillespie, Kate Davis ****

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Let’s say you set out to put together a summary of the basic science you need to know in the first couple of years of secondary school, but wanted to make it more

approachable than a typical textbook. That’s pretty much what Usborne has done here. It’s really three books in one with totally separate sections for biology, chemistry and physics, each with its own contents pages, each starting out with a quick summary of what the subject is, what people working in this field do, and what it has done for us.

Overall it works well – the illustrations are fun and useful, and the text mixes snippets of history, little stories and factoids with the more straightforward stuff. So, for instance, you’ll find the kind of biology terms, chemical equations and physics laws you’d find in a textbook, but approached much more accessibly with lots more context. For all this, the book has to get a real pat on the back – and you certainly get plenty for your money. This is over 250 pages of fairly small print, it’s not your typical children’s summary.

There are some things I find hard to like about it. It doesn’t have the authors’ names on the cover, just the publisher – as an author, I find this rather disenfranchising, and not very pleasant. When it comes to the contents, much of it is great, but one thing jumps out as weird – rather than the obvious order of physics, chemistry and biology, the sections are reversed. This means that you keep hitting bits of physics (say) in the chemistry section that you haven’t covered yet. It’s idiotic not to have it the other way round so each subject builds on the next.

I also have to have my usual moan, which is more about the curriculum this book is fitted to than necessarily the authors’ intentions. The science is solidly Victorian. There is nothing about quantum theory (photons don’t even get a mention in the light section) and only a tiny mention of special relativity, with no general relativity. When will the people setting the curriculum understand that quantum theory and relativity are essential, they’re more fun than ‘old physics’ and should come first? Argghhh! There are a couple of small errors in the physics (I haven’t checked the other sections as thoroughly). The planetary model is used for atoms, while in the gravity section we are told ‘Gravity in space is non-existent,’ using astronauts as an example. Sorry, the gravity on ISS is around 0.9g. Free fall is a matter of falling under gravity and missing, it is not zero gravity. There’s also a sad lack of explanation in some parts of the physics. When talking about floating it’s all about density – nothing about forces or why there is upthrust – rather disappointing.

I can’t blame Usborne for the curriculum, though, and given those constraints this is a very useful and full book to make the textbook topics more approachable.

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Review by Brian Clegg