Popular Science Children's Review - Transform: How Everyday Things Are Made

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Review - Transform[ed]: How Everyday Things Are Made - Bill Slavin

Where does rubber come from? How do they make football? Or a whistle? Bill Slavin's elegant book provides the answers. The main content comes in two page spreads on a wide range of everyday things. An article starts with a text introduction, giving a brief history of the item, then has a well-illustrated (Slavin is both writer and illustrator here) numbered sequence, showing the stages of the manufacture. There is often also room for a little box or two containing a fascinating fact or little aside giving more information.

This all works brilliantly. The introductory text is really interesting - in fact it could have been a bit longer. The illustrated processes are clear and effective. And those little fact boxes lighten things up well. It works as both an end-to-end book - where you are likely to read those introductions and just skim the processes - and a reference to find out more about a particular product and process. Transform is broken down into five segments - fun and games, covering sports and entertainment objects; around the house, which is fairly self explanatory; soup to nuts, covering the edibles; cover ups for clothing and material; and back to basics, on how simple construction materials are made. It's always fun, but never fails to bring out some little piece of information that even adults may be surprised by.

Although the book has clearly been written for an American audience (it features, for instance, a baseball and an American football), the UK version (distinguished by dropping the "ed" from the end of Transformed) has been effectively massaged into more UK friendly language, so you will read about rubbers (not erasers), trainers (rather than sneakers), crisps (not chips) and aluminium (rather than aluminum).

It's hard to find anything about this book not to like. There is perhaps just a little too much on basic materials (it's hard to get too excited about aluminium, and there's already an entry on aluminium foil), and there was no need to have an American football when there was already a normal football. Equally, it would have been nice to see a few more devices (MP3 player?, computer?) which are certainly everyday things now.

But to be honest that's just scratching around to find something not to like. This is a great book that will work well both in schools and for individual children who are interested in where things come from. Neat.

Only in hardback

Reviewed by Brian Clegg

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

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