Discovering Dinosaurs by Anne Rooney and Suzanne Carpenter

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Lift the flap books have progressed somewhat since I was a child. This one comes with sounds! Taking us layer by layer, through various different ages of dinosaurs, we meet a variety of creatures, some of whom are very familiar but some I'd never heard of before! Each scene peels open, layer by layer, showing you what the various dinosaurs are getting up to, with background noises, roars and squawks to accompany them! The book creates a dinosaur experience, rather than just being facts about dinosaurs it's very visual, placing the dinosaurs in their habitats and giving us sounds too that spike your imagination.

The book is structured to open more like a wall calendar than a book, which encourages you to sit on the floor with it in front of you, and fully immerse yourself in what's going on. Beginning with an overview of the periods of time covered, it then takes you through each period, starting with a page all about the various dinosaurs, with their picture, brief information about them, their name, and a very helpful pronounciation guide for their name! You then lift the page to open the dinosaurs' scene, and this is layered, revealing what's happening with all the dinosaurs, who is eating who etc! Smaller animals are included too on a page that looks at tiny mammals and birds, and there's also a page for sea creatures.

It's a good, sturdy book, which is important to note I think, and the flaps are large and easy to peel open, so nothing fiddly and likely to break within the first five minutes! I'm not sure how authentic the 'wild' sounds are (I don't suppose anyone can be sure!) but they do provide atmosphere as you read. Tiny tots might find some of the roars a little scary, but your in-house dinosaur experts will enjoy the feeling of actually being there in amongst the dinosaurs! The sounds are, also, not so loud as to drive you completely insane every time the book comes down off the shelf!

Some of the illustrations were a little pastel-hued for my liking, but that does soften the whole book, making it accessible rather than terrifying, so perhaps it's a good thing! There is, of course, much debate around the colour of dinosaurs, whether they had fur, or feathers, or scales...I think for this book just let all of that slide and enjoy the rather pretty spotty, striped dinosaurs. The shapes of the different types do seem right (though I am not an expert!) but this is not a seriously scientific work but rather an introduction to dinosaurs for younger readers. The flaps work very well however, joining up neatly as you turn each one. There's a lot to look at on each page, and you can easily flip backwards and forwards between the dinosaur inventory and the scene, to figure out who is doing what.

I think this is a good example of an interesting non-fiction book for Primary school-aged children. Some can end up being very dry, especially for smaller children, so this is good for little ones to enjoy all the flap lifting and page turning, and older children who want to expand their encyclopaedic dinosaur knowledge!

Further reading suggestion: For more dinosaur delights try Dinosaur Detective's Search-and-Find Rescue Mission by Sophie Guerrive or Dinosaurs (Henry's House) by Philip Ardagh and Mike Gordon Please share on: Facebook, Twitter and Instagram

You can read more book reviews or buy Discovering Dinosaurs by Anne Rooney and Suzanne Carpenter at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy Discovering Dinosaurs by Anne Rooney and Suzanne Carpenter at Amazon.com.

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