From School Library Journal
Grade 3-5. Moss may have written the popular Sesame Street anthem "Rubber Duckie," but he proves in this volume that he knows lots about dinosaurs. He makes learning about them such fun that kids everywhere will be begging to be taken to the nearest museum to "find a footprint, a bone, or a tooth/To grab yourself a piece of dinosaur truth." Interspersed with clever, rhyming poems are a dinosaur math quiz and one of the world's shortest poems (three words) with one of the longest tiles (20 words). There are echoes of Jack Prelutsky here, in the pacing, rhyme schemes, and sheer humor, but there's also much scientific substance in the midst of the hilarity. Facts, phrases, and frivolity combine to form a fascinating, fun look into our prehistoric past. One of the best entries is a poem about how scientists measure the brain size of early primates?by filling their skulls with uncooked rice. Leigh's playful illustrations make even the scariest dinosaur a little less scary?and all the more endearing. Even the cranky ankylosaurus, with his scaly back, is softened through the cartoon line drawings that provide much expression in just a few strokes. As a science and nature lesson or just a poetic romp, Bone Poems is the Tyrannosaurus rex of prehistoric poetry.?Sharon Korbeck, Waupaca Area Public Library, WI
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From the Inside Flap
Bones are important,
They do a big job.
Without them, you'd be just
A big squooshy blob.
In BONE POEMS, Jeff Moss rhapsodizes over T. Rex, celebrates Quetzalcoatlus, offers a ditty to Deinocheirus and a ballad to Brontosaurus. There's a dinosaur math quiz, free verse about a basketball-size dinosaur egg, and one of the world's shortest poems with one of the world's longest titles.
Inspired by the bones of dinosaurs and early mammals on display at the American Museum of Natural History, the author has created poems that are fresh, funny and delightfully off-beat. They are a joy to read—and read and read again.
