Friday, April 3, 2015

Older Than The Stars


Older Thank The Stars

by Karen C. Fox, illustrated by Nancy Davis


"You are older than the dinosaurs.
Older than the earth.
Older than the sun and all the planets.
You are older than the stars.
You are as old as the universe itself."

Thus begins Karen C. Fox's outstanding kid's cosmology book, Older Than the Stars, launching a narrative journey that starts at the singularity just before the big bang (without using the word 'singularity'), going through stellar formation, fusion, and supernovae, before arriving at the development and differentiation of life on Earth, culminating in you, the sentient bit of recycled atoms that is reading the book. The book is divided into two separate narratives - the first in verse ("This is the blast intense enough, to hurl the atoms so strong and tough, that formed in the star of red-hot stuff, that burst from the gas in a giant puff..."), with simple interpretive sidebars in prose ("Each star shone brightly for billions of years. But stars don't live forever. Whenever a star died, it exploded in a giant fireball called a supernova..."), that
provide the details of how our galaxy, solar system, and planet came into being, without going over a curious kid's head.

All of this well thought out (and fun to read) text is highlighted by gorgeous, vibrant, full-page illustrations by Nancy Davis. Between the big ideas, flowing text, and engrossing images, Older Than the Stars is sure to be a crowd-pleaser for kids of all ages.

Older Thank The Starsby Karen C. Fox, illustrated by Nancy Davis