Buzz [Hardcover]

DK Publishing (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 8 and up | Grade Level: 3 and up

Unlike any other creepy crawly title on the market, this vivid book not only teaches the basics about insects and other invertebrates, but brings the amazing world of worms, beetles, snails, millipedes, and spiders into our everyday lives. Three bug sounds are embedded in the cover to enhance the experience of looking at beetles, moths, crickets, and more.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...this book not only provides kids with loads of information, but includes games, quizzes and stunning photography." -- Publishers Weekly

"An educational, visually appealing tome...Full of facts, this book will have a long shelf life." -- Detroit Free Press

"Bug fans can dip in and out of this beautifully produced volume, but they will want to pore over every page." -- Shelf Awareness

"Fascinating." -- Buffalo News

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Hardcover: 144 pages
• Publisher: DK CHILDREN (June 18, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0756629128
• ISBN-13: 978-0756629120
• Product Dimensions: 11.8 x 8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #282,948 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Gimmick of a Cover Will Attract You, the Content Inside Will Make You Buy It!, November 8, 2007

By 

James N Simpson (Gold Coast, QLD Australia) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Buzz (Hardcover)

Most books that use some sort of gimmick on their cover usually have used up their entire budget on the cover and the pages of content inside are generally pretty average. Not so with Buzz, an entertaining read that will teach you stuff too! For those only seeing this book online the cover has three press me buttons, one is a cricket, one a bee and one a mosquito. Pressing on these buttons the book will make the sound of these insects. Interestingly the image on Amazon's product page has only one press me button and that's a fly a button which isn't on the Australian/UK version so maybe the American market has slightly different less complicated cover. Worth investigating if this is important to you. I've uploaded the book's image of the three button cover I borrowed from my library, you may wish to check it out. I'd say if you order it on Amazon you'll just get the fly single button one they display though.

The cover aside, the content inside is where this book excels. Thousands of great facts about creepy crawlies to impress all your friends at the next dinner party or to use as trivia questions if you're hosting a trivia night, to complete that school assignment or if you just want to learn about insects.

The book is quite interactive as well with the reader asked to spot the fake (insects pretending to be deadly creatures to avoid predators), match the parent to child (adult insect to various grubs and larvae), Top Thumps Bugs is a card game available through photocopying pages and turning them into playing cards and other interesting interactive ways to learn and retain knowledge are on the pages inside.

Detailed sketches showing what's inside an insect's exoskeleton using a locust as an example are just fascinating. You'll learn that insects don't have eyelids and see how they see objects. Learn about cultures that eat insects (80% of the world's population) as well there's some recipes for you to try such as Crispy Mealworm Stir-Fry or Bee Grubs in Coconut Cream.

Buzz covers all kinds of insects (which make up 90% of all animals in the world) from the 1/3rd which are beetles, to spiders, butterflies, ants and all kinds of insects. Career options for those interested in working with insects are also included along with heaps of other stuff as well!

A great, entertaining and educational book, I borrowed it from the library but its worth owning, I'm ordering a copy. The advantage that online buying has for a book like this is that the buttons won't be worn out by customers in the store.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book buzzed its way into our kid's room --- and stayed, September 11, 2007

By 

Jesse Kornbluth "Head Butler" (New York) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Buzz (Hardcover)

Press the photo of a mosquito on the cover, and there's that annoying whine. Press the bee, hear a buzz. The cricket chirps.

Yes, I'd say that "Buzz" is off to a good start.

"Buzz" is a hard-covered, oversized, picture-and-text book aimed at 4-to-8 year-olds. It asks the question: "What's all the buzz about these bugs?" And if the field testing in this house is typical, 136 pages of answers are barely enough.

Did you know:

-- Insects were the first animals to walk on land (400 million years ago).

-- If every other living thing died, insects wouldn't blink. But if insects disappeared, no pollinated flowers, no crops --- disaster.

-- For every person on the planet: 200 million insects.

-- Number of Anthropods ("insects, spiders and other creepy-crawlies") in a square yard of wooded land: 1.5 million.

-- Insects must warm up their flight muscles before takeoff.

-- Ants can drag 1,700 times their own weight. (Strongest animal in the world: the rhinoceros beetle, which can lift 850 times its weight.)

-- Insects, lacking eyelids, rub their eyes to clean them.

-- Insects are a good source of vitamins and minerals. In Thailand, fried insects are sold by the bag.

The delightful factoids --- at least to this Nature-challenged parent --- are only the start of this book's appeal. That's because it's from DK Publishing, which seems to put out an endless series of uniformly excellent picture-and-text books for kids. "Buzz", published in 2007, may be the pinnacle. Consider this spread: On the left-hand page, in a appealing jungle of large typefaces, are two stunning facts ("90% of all animal species are insects. One-third of these are beetles"), and, on the right, a photograph of dead beetles mounted in an exhibition case, row upon neat row, ten neat rows in all. You get the idea --- dramatically.

Kids love cool facts. Ours is surely not unique in wanting to know cool facts a day or two before the other kids. And that's how she's "reading" this book --- a few pages a night, one or two nights a week. She doesn't know yet about the other DK books we've ordered; we're going to put them ever so gradually into the rotation. Otherwise, we might have a kid who knows pretty much everything about everything. And we wouldn't want that.

5.0 out of 5 stars Good purchase, June 9, 2009

By 

Shirley Mitchell "media buff" (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Buzz (Hardcover)

Buzz books by Insect Lore are excellent gifts. My grandson loves this book and my daughter says she has purchased more products from Insect Lore and is very pleased.