Catherine Saunders

Anew edition of a 1995 favorite, this volume will draw in today’s children with the immediacy of its photos of 44 international children.

Six sections feature, in turn, North America, South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Southeast Asia and Australasia. Each begins with a generalized two-page spread of information including a “fact file,” a large map, headshots of each region’s children, a famous place (the usual suspects, such as the Grand Canyon and the pyramids), one animal, and show more a food item. Profiled children are presented in large active photos (set on white backgrounds in familiar DK style) with smaller images of family and home, favorite activities, typical foods, toys, and, often, pets. Each child’s signature (in appropriate writing systems), the word(s) for “hello” (with pronunciation), small maps (difficult to make out), and facts about their localities are also included. Text is limited to short paragraphs and photo captions. It is the engaging photos that pop, showing children in both contemporary, Western-style dress and traditional clothes still worn for special occasions. There are nuclear, extended, single-parent, and divorced families; Alonso from Mexico has a sister who has a wife; Morgan from France is the son of a mixed-race couple (living separately); Andre, of Australian Aboriginal descent, lives with his grandparents; New Zealander Jamie has a Maori mother and white father.

More important than ever to combat intolerance and encourage interest in readers’ young peers, this highly visual overview is well worth the update. (Nonfiction. 8-11) show less

This was a fun look at some of our favorite characters from Disney films, specifically films that feature Disney princesses. We've got older stuff, such as Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella, as well as new stuff, including Raya and the Last Dragon, and Tangled. The thing that I didn't appreciate was that for a DK/Disney collaboration, this book was very low quality when it came to images. A lot of the pictures were grainy, as if they were copied and pasted from somewhere on the internet.

Look show more elsewhere if you want something high-quality. show less

This is one my 4 year old read to me and then I read back to him. Most kids love anything to do with super heroes, and this is one he picked for himself from the club library. (Well, as one of the voluntary librarians, I did leave a set on display because I knew he - and other kids - would be tempted to read them.)

This is a very simplified version of Spider-Man's story (more of a bio than a story) for early readers, in the DK series. It is 32 pages in all, with each page being one or two show more sentences in large text, accompanied by a large comic-book style illustration.

The text was well-aimed with age-appropriate vocabulary; fairly simple, but with some harder words, like 'radioactive' and 'exhibition'. There were also, scattered through the book, 8 illustrated 'dictionary boxes' (with words like 'web' and 'rooftops') that I found we didn't need. These appear again on the back page.

Unfortunately, as my child pointed out, Peter Parker looked different in almost every illustration, which I couldn't work out a rationale for.

3.5 stars show less

I still have my copy of the original version that came out in the 90's, and I was super excited to see that this had been updated and republished. I still remember a lot of information about the kids from the original, and I think this is a great book for showing kids what other children's lives are like around the world. Fantastic update, and one I will definitely recommend at any opportunity.