The Plesiosaur’s Neck

Two undeniable facts: an awful lot of kids really love dinosaurs and a huge number of dinosaur books have been produced for them.  You can now add The Plesiosaur’s Neck to the list of books that will fascinate young palaeontologists and congratulate its creators too for finding a fresh approach. The book introduces us to Poppy the Albertonectes plesiosaur, and poses the question what was her preposterously long neck (almost two thirds of her entire body length) for? It suggests various answers to this, all of them genuine scientific theories, via the combination of a friendly, almost sing-a-long rhyming narrative text by Jonathan Emmett and equally friendly text boxes, supplied by expert Dr Adam S. Smith, and illustrations by Adam Larkum that give Poppy and her fellow sea creatures distinct personalities, while remaining scientifically accurate. It works very well and will catch youngsters’ imaginations while giving them a really good idea of how plesiosaurs lived, and insight into how scientists form their theories too. A lively and effective book – watch out for the wise-cracking cephalopods and their cheeky undersea puns too.