"Digitally enhanced mixed-media artwork beautifully supports and extends the text. A welcome addition to science or poetry units." — Booklist (starred review)
"This rocks." — Kirkus Reviews
"An excellent introduction to our awesome planet for novice geographers and poets alike."
— School Library Journal
"Playfully informational. Poetry and art combine to create an upbeat spin through Earth’s forms." — Publishers Weekly
"The poems are exceptional...truly a poetry-geography STEM gem!" — Heidi Bee Roemer, author of Peekity Boo, What YOU Can Do and host of S.T.E.A.M. Powered Poetry
"With her signature wordplay and deep curiosity about the natural world, Joan invites readers on an awe-inspiring journey through Earth's most breathtaking landscapes!" — Georgia Heard, author of Welcome to the Wonder House; NCTE Excellence in Poetry for Children Award-winner
"This book inspires awed ‘wow’ on every page. Precise yet playful words combined with bold and brilliant art bring our vast, fantastic world down to earth…and into our hands." — Lee Wardlaw, author of Won Ton - A Cat Tale Told in Haiku; Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award-winner
"Fun to read and loaded with fascinating information, Awesome Earth is Graham's valentine to the planet.... Marvelous." — Jama Kim Rattigan, author of Dumpling Soup; host of Jama's Alphabet Soup blog
"A welcome addition to the world of science and children's poetry." — Dr. Patricia Stohr-Hunt, Chair, Education Dept., University of Richmond, VA; President, VA Assoc. of College and Teacher Educators (VACTE); host of Miss Rumphius Effect blog
"This collection of poems makes us fall in love with our planet all over again . . . fabulous."
— Susan Corry, Reviewer, Good Reads with Ronna
"Describe[s] the Earth and its features in a succinct way that is easy for children to digest and rare to find in books about geography . . . It is really fun to have both the meaning of the words and the visual look of the words on the page support each other."
— Darcie Caswell, Librarian
"The imagery of the words is beautifully reflected in the dramatic illustrations."
— Jean Greenlaw, Reviewer, Book Talk
2024-10-12
Concrete poetry on geological themes, shaped to fit inside digital collage images of their subjects.
“The Earth is / an artist, at work every / day, with powerful tools that / come into play,” writes Graham in a round-bodied excerpt that caps a world-spanning tour of landform types from “Continents” to “Stalactites,” “Stalagmites,” and sandstone “Arches.” Though limited to a little over 20 examples, the author does find room for “Glacier” and “Hoodoos,” while “Cave” is more concerned with starry bioluminescent glowworms than the rocky chambers they light up. Still, her simply written observations often mix sonorous language (“Shape-shifter, / dune-drifter, sand-sifter, / hot desert winds build billowy dunes”) with descriptions of process; while appreciating the poems as lyrics, readers will also effortlessly absorb information about continental drift, erosion, how the three kinds of rock are formed, and other geological basics. Except for a cross-sectional slice of our planet showing layers from surface to core, most of the forms Garcia portrays in her strongly modeled land- and seascapes are at least loosely based on specific locales that are identified in the author’s photo-strewn closing notes on each feature.
Highly selective, but as a first introduction to landforms, this rocks. (glossary, additional resources)(Informational picture-book poetry. 6-8)
