Octopuses (Animal Prey) [Library Binding]

Sandra Markle (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Markle follows her Animal Predators series, which was named a 2005 Booklist Top 10 Nonfiction Series for Youth, and her Animal Scavengers books with a new series that focuses on yet another strand of the food chain: Animal Prey. As in Markle's previous series, this title about octopuses, both predator and prey, features eye-popping color photographs of the animals on nearly every spread. Markle's lively prose brings readers right into the underwater world with sensory descriptions and details kids can relate to. The "pale twilight glow" filtering into an octopus' den is easy to imagine, as is the garbage pile of shells outside the octopus' door. Markle skillfully inserts facts about octopus anatomy, habitat, behavior, reproduction, and species into vivid descriptions of animals on the move, hunting for prey while eluding their own predators. Follow-up questions, a glossary, and suggestions for further reading close this exciting introduction to "nature's escape artists." Gillian Engberg
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Library Binding: 40 pages
• Publisher: Lerner Publications (February 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0822560631
• ISBN-13: 978-0822560630
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 11.2 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,404,722 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

SANDRA MARKLE

Sandra Markle is the author of more than 200 books for children, such as A Mother's Journey (Charlesbridge, 2006), How Many Baby Pandas (Walker, 2009), The Case of the Vanishing Golden Frogs (Millbrook, 2011), Butterfly Tree (Peachtree Publishing, 2011). She has won numerous awards for this work, including Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book, Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices, NSTA Outstanding Science Trade Book, SB& F finalist, John Burroughs List of Nature Books for Young Readers, Junior Library Guild Selection, Orbis Pictus Recommended Book, Charlotte Zolotow Award, and MORE.
She was honoured with the title of "Best of Children's Non-Fiction" Georgia Author Of The Year award five times and was named one of 1999's Women of the Year by Women in Technology International for her contributions to science and technology.

In addition to her books, Sandra Markle has developed science specials for CNN and PBS. She is also noted for developing On-Line Expedition: Antarctica, one of the first on-line educational programs and continued adding further on-line reports from Antarctica while working on book projects in 1996 and 1999 as a grantee for the National Science Foundation's Artists and Writers Program.

Reviewers have heaped praise on Markle's books, including:
Outside and Inside Bats "The author presents a particularly felicitous accord of words and pictures in an outstanding science book for the primary grades." The Horn Book Magazine
Outside and Inside Alligators "This newest installment of the Outside and Inside series adds another fine book to a top-notch series." Bookselling This Week, a Kid's Pick of the Lists
Outside and Inside Dinosaurs It's like sitting down with a dinosaur expert who happens to be a great teacher." The Horn Book Magazine

Sandra Markle remains proudest, though, of the praise she has received in fan mail from children. She's happy to fulfill the requests of the young readers that urge her to "please write more."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Eye Popping Pics, August 28, 2009

By 

Spudman (Pasadena, MD United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Octopuses (Animal Prey) (Paperback)

The photos in Octopuses are indeed eyepopping, so don't look at them too long if you don't want your eyes to pop.
Octopi (as I like to call them) are intelligent, fascinating, even amazing creatures. Some people even keep them as pets though the octopus is high maintencance and has a relatively short lifespan.

In this book the young reader is treated to engaging text to accompany the vivid and spectacular photos, many of them full page dazzlers. Students within a wide age span to whom I showed this book all showed an intense interest and curiosity in it. The book has no table of contents, but does have a rudimentary glossary in the back and a short index.

If you know a reluctant middle school or late elementary grade reader, hand him or her this book. It very well could motivate some further reading.

5.0 out of 5 stars The combination of excellent writing and stunning photography will draw even the most reluctant reader into this book!, September 15, 2009

By 

D. Fowler "Dragonfly77" (Vermont) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Octopuses (Animal Prey) (Library Binding)

The octopus is a predator, but ocean going animals "such as sharks, seals, and dolphins" consider them to be a tasty snack. The octopus has several defense mechanisms that often thwart the efforts of these predators. The octopus is an "escape artist" and when it squirts out a large jet of ink it simply disappears while its predator is left wondering what all the commotion was about. Many like the blue-ringed octopus have unique ways of blending in with their environment. It can actually change its vibrant blue spotted skin to blend in with the ocean floor. Another octopus, the mimic octopus of Indonesia, can actually "put six tentacles down a hole and stretch out its other two tentacles in a way that make it look like a banded, venomous sea snake." The photograph of this unusual octopus is amazing!

The octopus has several ways to avoid becoming a tasty snack, but is also a predator to be reckoned with. Its ability to camouflage itself is also handy when it comes to capturing other creatures. Whoops, that crab looks like a good lunch! Among octopuses you'll meet in this book are the southern star-eyed, the giant Pacific, the mimic of Indonesia, the southern keeled (Australia and New Zealand), the blue-ringed (Australia to Japan), the banded string-arm (Australia), and the amazing transparent glass octopus. You'll learn all kinds of things about the octopus from how it catches its prey to how it reproduces and raises its young.

This is an amazing book, but I've read several by Sandra Markle before and was expecting nothing less than perfection, what is exactly what I found. It was very well written and researched and the photography was stunning. This combination will pull even the most reluctant reader along the bottom of the ocean floor following the life of the octopus. One of my favorite shots is not of an octopus, but the face shot of a seal looking for her lunch. This is one vibrant book of six in the "Animal Prey" series you might want to add to your library!