Dinosaurs: The Most Complete, Up-to-Date Encyclopedia for Dinosaur Lovers of All Ages [図書館]

Holtz and Rey's Dinosaurs raises the bar not just for all dinosaur books but for all children's books on any subject. I have never -- never -- seen a children's non-fiction book tackle its subject so head-on, in such depth, and with such approachability as this new encyclopedia does. It has something for everyone: the youngest child can enjoy Luis Rey's distinctive, dynamic illustrations; slightly older children will appreciate the descriptions of individual dinosaurs; those older still will be able to understand chapters on the history of dinosaurs, the fossilisation process, geological time and more. And even most adults will learn something from the chapter on cladistics -- surely a first in a book aimed primarily at children.

Tom Holtz is respected as one of the world's leading experts on tyrannosaurs, and more generally for his gift of explaining complex concepts as simply and clearly as possible. His prose is easy to read without being condescending, and always informative. Luis Rey is known for his characteristically colourful and feathery dinosaur art: his work could not be more different from the ``old-school'' dinosaur art of Knight and Burian: it's a welcome antidote to the dull, slow image of dinosaurs that predominated in the books of twenty or even ten years ago. That vividness is combined with a scientific rigour that is by no means universal in dinosaur art to give a new and exciting view of how dinosaurs may well have looked in life.

The book's coverage is impressively complete. An appendix gives basic information on every dinosaur named at the time of publication (about 800 genera), and the main part of the book is a sequence of chapters describing particular dinosaur groups in much more detail. For example, there are separate chapters about coelophysoids and ceratosaurs, spinosauroids, carnosaurs, primitive coelurosaurs, tyrannosauroids, ornithomimosaurs and alvarezsaurs, oviraptorosaurs and therizinosauroids, deinonychosaurs and avialans -- and that's just the theropods! Ornithischians are covered in similar detail, and while sauropodomorphs as usual draw the short straw, they do at least receive four chapters (twice as many as in The Dinosauria, 2nd edition!)

Not only that, the book is BIG -- roughly A4 in size and a good inch thick, printed on thick, glossy paper. Weighing in at a solid 1.7 kg, it has the heft of a proper encyclopedia. At the price (currently $23.09) it's truly absurd value for money, and sits comfortably on the shelf alongside the Glut and Currie-and-Padian encyclopedias costing five times as much.

If I had to criticise this book, then its one imperfection would the absence of a chapter on osteology. A tour of the dinosaur skeleton, explaining the names of the bones, how they fit together and what they do would have been a perfect fit for the more advanced material that's already included. But when the only thing you can criticise about a book is that you wish there was more of it, you know you're on to a good thing.

This book is for the dino-connoisseur, the tyranno-gourmand, the read-all-about-it-a-saurus. The book covers all things dinosaur from a review of geologic time and the history of fossil discoveries to dinosaur babies and dinosaur dung.
Forty-two chapters and 472 pages examine every branch of the dinosaur family tree.
In-depth chapters on coelurosaurs, prosauropods, tyrannosauroids, ceratopsids, (and the list goes on) are enhanced with colorful illustrations that "flesh-out" the detailed drawings of the skeletons which also accompany the chapters.

Personal essays from 33 paleontologists extend the chapters. Dr. Scott D. Sampson discusses "Male and Female Dinosaurs--Can we tell the difference?" and Dr. Matthew T. Carrano writes about "Walking and Running Dinosaurs." Dr. Luis Chiappe reviews the origins of birds during the Mesozoic Era. All of these essays are one page in length and very engaging and readable. The reader hears the scientist's voice explaining their interest and passion for the subject.

This is NOT an Eyewitness book with different reading levels and distinct blocks of text but the illustrations are captioned and sections are headed in uppercase titles. The text is laid out in two columns with a nicely sized type and good white space.

Extensive dinosaur genus charts at the back refer the reader to the matching chapters. If you know a dinosaur fanatic, this is the book for them.

Dinosaurs: The Most Complete, Up-to-Date Encyclopedia for Dinosaur Lovers of All Ages is aptly titled. This truly is for all ages. The organization and scope are outstanding and Dr Thomas R. Holtz, Junior's writing is crystal clear and interesting. He makes the history and changes in the field fascinating reading. Dinosaurs is full of illustrations by Luis V. Rey that expertly compliment the text. There are also charts and photographs. I also like the brief articles by various scholars included in most chapters. There is an extensive Dinosaur Genus List, Glossary, and Index. This book is a remarkable value and priced not only for every school and public library, but affordable for lovers of dinosaurs everywhere. Karen Woodworth-Roman, www.librarians.info