Sea Soup: Zooplankton (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Bill Curtsinger (Illustrator, Photographer)

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Gr 5-8-A companion to this team's Sea Soup: Phytoplankton (Tilbury House, 1999), Zooplankton opens a pellucid window into the drifting world of mostly minute animals that, along with phytoplankton, form an aqueous "soup" that nourishes a wide variety of sea creatures from the tiniest copepods to gigantic blue whales. Curtsinger's often extraordinary color photos allow readers to envision the often microscopically small creatures delineated in the text, while Cerullo invites them to meet the fastest animal in the world and to discover how zooplankton can turn a submarine "invisible." This is a fascinating look at a watery zoo of creatures whose ecological importance is far beyond the measure of their size.

Patricia Manning, formerly at Eastchester Public Library, NY

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Gr. 4-7. Cerullo and Curtsinger, whose Sea Soup: Phytoplankton (1999) presented the tiny plants that drift in the oceans, now explore drifting animals such as krill, jellyfish, and the larval stages of many fish and crustaceans. On each double-page spread there is a single question--"What is the fastest animal in the world?"--accompanied by a greatly magnified photo and the answer--"Shaped like a bullet with antennae, the copepod, a tiny cousin of lobsters and crabs, is for its size the fastest animal of earth." The spread that follows offers several colorful clear photographs as well as a few paragraphs of information about copepods and how they compare with cheetahs (the fastest land animal). Other topics discussed within this question-and-answer format include zooplankton as food, zooplankton migration, and dangerous zooplankton. Intriguing. Carolyn Phelan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 4-8
  
• Hardcover: 40 pages
• Publisher: Tilbury House Publishers (March 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0884482197
• ISBN-13: 978-0884482192
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 9.1 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #815,476 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Engaging and captivating, September 29, 2009

By	Bri Meets Books (USA) - See all my reviews

Sea Soup: Zooplankton introduces readers to the various forms of the organism. From the moment you open this book, stunning underwater images greet you. The layout is very attractive, and catches your eye immediately. There's splashes of color, vibrant photos in bubbles, but it still flows well, so you get all the information at an easy pace.

The opening starts off as if fiction and the letters cascade down the side of the page, a visual representation of a diver's descent down below:

"The moment they dropped into the dark,alien world, the searchers knew they were not alone. - (p.2, Sea Soup: Zooplankton)

The book talks directly to the reader, asking questions, inviting the reader to explore the world of the zooplankton. On one page, it's stark white, and in the middle, a bright colorful photo of a a jellyfish and the text, "Who's who in a zoo plankton zoo?" or "Are there zooplankton you don't ever want to bump into?" The corresponding pages then answer the question. This theme continues throughout the book, always engaging the reader into a discussion.

Reference wise, Sea Soup: Zooplankton packs a lot into a thin book. Sizes, their diets, the life cycles, and the various types of zooplankton are covered. Prior to reading this book, my plankton knowledge involved Spongebob Squarepants, and this book definitely filled in the gaps. There's a glossary and even an additional teacher's guide available from the publisher, for those who want more information.