Popular Science Children's Review - Space, Stars & Slimy Aliens

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Review - Space, Stars & Slimy Aliens - Nick Arnold

Welcome to the Horrible Science entry on astronomy and cosmology, that boldly goes... well, mostly around the solar system. (The aliens, by the way, are admitted early on to be largely a made up vehicle for explanation. This is just as well as SETI, for example, is never mentioned.)

A lukewarm cheer for this one. The bit of the start, where it says how big the universe is, proves horribly reminiscent of Douglas Adams in Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy ("'Space’, it says, ‘is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the street to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to space.") Of course, Adams was mocking just this "gee, wow, isn't it big" style.

Then it deals with practically all the universe at high speed with very little detail. The description, for example, of how the sun works is certainly compact, but not hugely informative (gravity crushes hydrogen so hard it becomes helium, and some of the hydrogen is crushed into energy. Hmm.) A few of the obvious wonders of the universe are given a quick intro, but I don't remember anything about the big bang, quasars, dark matter, etc. etc.

After getting the exciting stuff out of the way, Nick Arnold then drones on about the solar system in mind-crushing detail. Each planet is visited, and once you get the interesting ones out of the way it gets very samey. (In fact, even his imaginary aliens doing the visiting get a bit bored.) He also misses the opportunity to overcome one of the great fallacies of the solar system. When he talks about the asteroid belt we see, just like in the movies, a great crowd of rocks filling space - mostly just yards apart. Sadly it ain't like that - there's vastly more space than asteroid in the asteroid belt.

I don't want to be too hard on this book, hence the small cheer. It does get quite a lot about the solar system in, and if a young reader is already interested in space it will be appreciated - but it could have been so much better. There is an alternative - Kjartan Poskitt's The Gobsmacking Galaxy - but unfortunately that isn't much better.

Only in paperback

Reviewed by Brian Clegg

Review by Emily, year 6 (age 11):

I liked reading this 'horrible science' book and I think other children will too because it helps you learn while making you laugh. The illustrations are incredibly funny and there is a joke on almost every page.

Throughout the book there is a story with a chapter in most of the sections of the book called 'Oddblob's Alien Adventure'. In this story the main character is Oddblob, an alien going on a tour of our solar system. It's very funny and refers to each section of the book.

'Space, Stars and Slimy Aliens' gives you information on the sun, the stars, the planets and other things about our universe with extra quizzes and fact files.

I recommend this book to children aged 8-12 (and possibly older) because of its knowledge-giving humour.

* Our age range recommendation is an estimated guide, but individual readers outside the range could still enjoy the book!

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