Are YOU small? A little question sends readers on a BIG adventure to see the smallest of the small. From an average-size kid . . . to a cookie crumb . . . to a water molecule . . . all the way down to a single quark, readers discover that size is a matter of perspective.
Once there was magic in Britain. There were dragons and wizards and green knights and round tables and kings that pulled swords out of stones. But now, the doors to the Otherworld have closed, and the magic is gone.
The lightest birds in the sky, hummingbirds are capable of incredible feats, such as flying backwards, diving at speeds of sixty-one miles per hour, and beating their wings more than sixty times a second.
In the wild, Grecia the toucan loved to soar from branch to branch and sing for all the creatures of the rainforest. Until, one night, loud voices echoed through the trees, sticks and rocks flew, and Grecia fell from her favorite avocado tree, tragically breaking her beak.
Our world is full of many amazing buildings. We have made beautiful stained-glass windows that turn rooms into rainbows and windmills that can turn grain into flour. From modern homes with solar panels to the Great Pyramids of Egypt, how do we know so much about buildings?
Butt or Face? Volume 2 continues the delightfully cheeky challenge with a whole new set of animals from all over the world. Examine a close-up photo of an animal and then guess whether you're looking at the top or the…um…bottom.
We learn that some microbes get a bad rep for making us sick, but that most are helpful creatures that allow us to digest food, make cheese, and even enable snowflakes to form in winter.
Do tortoises take vitamins? Do badgers wash their hands after using the toilet? This eagerly anticipated fourth and final installment of the Do Animals? series raises these questions and more about how animals take care of their bodies—much like the ways people maintain their hygiene!
People just want to have fun! Games have been around for thousands of years, but with the first blips on a screen, they really got electric. Now video games are better than ever, ready for on-the-go, great for sharing with friends, and even with immersive virtual reality. Video Games is an entertaining and informative look at the development of an invention that keeps kids of all ages entertained.
Flamingos are tall, wading birds known for their bright pink color. Their nests look like tiny volcanoes, and they live in areas that are considered extreme—from nearly boiling bodies of water filled with corrosive chemicals to cold, mountainous regions where ice freezes around their feet. And if you ask their snake friend, Joey, those aren’t the only things that are fabulous about flamingos!
Who better to teach kids about money than MONEY himself? As readers follow along in this delightful, easy-to-understand picture book, they'll learn: how to earn money, how to save money, how to spend money (wisely) and the most important thing: how to give it away to help others!
Containing explanations on key words and concepts written in child-friendly, accessible language, with relatable examples, this book supports children's understanding in building an anti-ableist stance from an early age. Most importantly, the book empowers and encourages children to embrace individuality; to look out for one another, to be respectful and to celebrate disability as diversity.
Today, Alex is going to help her friend Atticus spot a real tiger in the wild. Atticus has never seen a tiger before, but Alex knows everything about tigers. She’s even made her own field guide about them, which she uses to explain to Atticus what to look for: stripes, big teeth, nocturnal!
The true story of José Andrés, an award-winning chef, food activist, and founder of World Central Kitchen, a disaster-relief organization that uses the power of food to nourish communities after catastrophe strikes.
When the seasons change and it’s time for a flock of sparrows to move on, a map made of stars guides their way. But when they reach the city, light pollution masks the map and confuses the birds. One sparrow becomes separated from the flock. A girl rescues the lost sparrow and decides to take action so this doesn’t happen again.
Look and Cook Breakfast: A First Book of Recipes in Pictures is a must-have introduction to cooking for kids. Following the same easy-to-read visual layout of Look and Cook Snacks, this cookbook features delicious sweet and savory breakfast recipes for the whole family to enjoy. (BS)
When Althea Gibson first dreamed of joining the big American tennis leagues, she was denied because she was Black. Angela Buxton dreamed of joining the best tennis clubs in Britain, but she was rejected because she was Jewish. When Angela heard that Althea was coming to Britain to compete, she skipped school to see the match. If Althea didn't let hatred stop her from playing the game she loved, Angela wouldn't either.
Everyone can make a difference when it comes to protecting the environment! This inviting book is full of 14 simple, everyday goals that anyone can achieve to bring about positive change. (BS)
As the child of Japanese immigrants, Wataru “Wat” Misaka often felt like he didn’t fully belong in either Japanese or American culture. He was sometimes excluded, treated differently, and bullied, even though he was born in the United States.
While at the ocean, a curious young girl goes searching for a seashell and finds an octopus friend instead. The encounter turns into an afternoon full of play and discovery. From eating, to napping, to playing, octopuses are just like us … aren’t they? Well, maybe not quite …
Picture Books
Award-winning author-illustrator Don Brown explores the history of electricity in this installment of the Big Ideas That Changed the World series.
Did you know that a piece of cloth from the Wright Brothers' Flyer has traveled to the moon, and Mars? With NASA photos and playful illustrations throughout, here is an incredible slice of hidden history and an introduction to the science of air and space for all ages.
There are 20 million billion ants on the planet, and we see them all the time. But did you know that ants have superpowers? Super strength and super speed are only the beginning. Ants might be small, but they set big records.
How did the Joshua Tree National Park in California come to be? Meet Minerva Hamilton Hoyt, an artist, activist, and environmentalist, whose determination saved the desert and helped to create the park, in this STEAM picture book.
Discover how to navigate the vast Australian outback, keep yourself alive in a sandstorm in the Arabian desert, avoid a bear attack in a North American forest, explore the dark depths of the Atlantic Ocean, and even perform a spacewalk in orbit!
Fannie Farmer, America’s most famous cooking teacher, discovers that precise measurements are a recipe for cooking success in this STEAM picture book that includes two of her classic recipes. (BS)
Goats and beavers. Drones and parachutes. Pinecones and beetles. What do they have in common? Believe it or not, they are all crucial tools in fighting, preventing, and adapting to wildfires! (BS)
Do you have what it takes to become a vet, a horse trainer, or to work at a nature reserve? Find out all about the incredible animal jobs you could do, from training to becoming an animal behaviorist or a wildlife rehabilitator to working at a zoo or even becoming a bug wrangler!
Follow a blue whale’s enormous body to the bottom of the ocean, where it sets the stage for a bustling new ecosystem to flourish. (BS)
Teen skateboarding phenom Sky Brown knows how to go big. After becoming a professional athlete at age 10, she became the first woman to land a frontside 540 at the X Games and won an Olympic medal at age 13.
Growing up in Cambodia, Malen knew that dangers from a long-ago war lay hidden underground. Buried explosives forced her and many others to live, farm, and play in fear. As she got older, Malen learned how to use a metal detector to find and safely dispose of these landmines.
In the last days of the Heroic Age of Exploration, Ernest Shackleton dreamed of crossing the frozen heart of Antarctica, a place of ferocious seas, uncharted mountains and bone-chilling cold. But when his ship, the Endurance became trapped in the deadly grip of the ice, Shackleton's dreams were shattered. (BS)
This book explores the wonders of nature with awe-inspiring, realistic illustrations at life-size. Across each fascinating spread, beautiful artwork shows breathtakingly large or unbelievably small natural wonders, including eyes, wings, tentacles, sand, snowflakes, flowers and much more, all at real-life size, or zoomed in for extra interest.
Teeth: You Only Get Two Sets takes young readers on an exciting journey through the intriguing world of dental health. This engaging non-fiction children's book explores everything from the origins of teeth to their internal structure.
This picture book for young readers is a tour of the human body revealing the wonders of how it all works — with some astonishing numbers and fascinating facts along the way. (BS)
Be inspired by ground-breaking artists from around the world, then test out their amazing techniques at home with 25 fun step-by-step activities.
Tens of millions of people live in places that experience(d) the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024 - and hundreds of millions more will see other future eclipses around the world. There's no better way to get ready for an eclipse and to learn about the underlying science than through this book and the related free app "Totality by Big Kid Science."
A hilarious illustrated middle-grade nonfiction offering about the most revolting jobs throughout history involving pee, poop, vomit, dead bodies, and all things disgusting. (BS)
From whales to dung beetles, What Poo Can Do explores how animals big and small are helping the planet every time they do a number two. (BS)
The best-selling (and wildly hilarious) Worst-Case Scenario series is back with 40 extreme survival tips for kids ages 8 to 12, great for adventurous fans of the I Survived series. (BS)
There’s always more to buy, buy, buy. Kids love trendy clothes, the latest electronics, fast food and even plastic gift cards. Sales draw us in, shiny new gadgets have us going ga-ga and personalized pop-up ads on our social media feeds have us frantically buying things—and throwing them out—without a second thought.
The COVID-19 pandemic taught us new words, like isolation, quarantine and social distancing. In places like the UK and Japan, governments have appointed ministers of loneliness to examine the problem and find ways to help their citizens.
Four hundred years ago, no one bothered to write down the exact words of stage plays. Characters’ lines were scribbled on small rolls of paper (as in, an actor’s role) and passed around, but no master script was saved for the future. The main reason we’ve heard of Romeo, Juliet, Hamlet, and Shakespeare himself is that a group of people made the excellent choice to preserve the plays after the Bard died.
Explore the fascinating history of America as told through the lens of food in this illustrated nonfiction middle grade book “sure to please history buffs and foodies alike”
In this semi-autobiographical collection of poems, Renée Watson writes about her experience growing up as a young Black girl at the intersections of race, class, and gender.
The United States Department of Defense has more than four hundred military bases across the country. They are used to house and train personnel, keep watch of enemies, support allies, and . . . protect America's plant and animal species.
On the morning of November 21, 1980, two small boats set out from Cape Cod for Georges Bank, a prosperous fishing ground one hundred miles out to sea. The National Weather Service had forecast typical fall weather, and the young crew aboard the Sea Fever and the Fair Wind had no reason to expect that this trip would be any different from the dozens they’d made earlier in the season.
Whether you’re an animal lover, a math master, a science whiz, a tech expert, a fashion fiend, a planet protector, a music marvel, an amazing artist, a born performer, or a sports fan – you can turn your passion into a profession!
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is one of history's most powerful acts of resistance. Here, author Joshua M. Greene (Signs of Survival) tells the true story of a young Jewish woman who was instrumental in the uprising as a smuggler of messages and weapons into and out of the Warsaw Ghetto.
In any ecosystem, every species has a role to play. From towering trees and ginormous whales to the smallest microorganisms, plants, fungi, and insects, each species is important to the overall health of the ecosystem. But some of those species play such vital roles that without them, the ecosystem might collapse. These are called keystone species.
An extensively researched, myth-busting account of the world’s most famous monster hoax—the Loch Ness Monster—and a cautionary tale on the dangers of misinformation.
This gorgeous look behind the lens at wildlife photography offers a unique chance to enter the fascinating world of meerkats.
In May of 1920, in a small town in the mountains of West Virginia, a dozen coal miners took a stand. They were sick of the low pay in the mines. The unsafe conditions. The brutal treatment they endured from mine owners and operators. The scrip they were paid-instead of cash-that could only be used at the company store.
Mountain of Fire is the narrative nonfiction account of the violent volcanic eruption of Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980, the story of the people who died, those who survived, and the heroes who fought to raise an alarm.
Growing up with undiagnosed OCD sure isn’t easy, and here Pan Cooke shares his own experiences with that condition in a graphic-novel memoir that is as funny as it is powerfully candid and openhearted.
In 2018, fourteen-year-old Claire Sarnowski stood with ninety-two-year-old Alter Wiener in front of the Oregon state senate to champion a cause the two friends both believed in: making Holocaust education mandatory in their state’s public school curriculum. Theirs was an unexpected friendship—she was in elementary school when they met, and he was an aging Holocaust survivor whose memoir she had read—and together they were going to change the American education system.
One of the founders of US cryptology who would eventually become one of the world’s greatest code breakers, Elizebeth Smith Friedman (1892–1980) was a brilliant mind behind many important battles throughout the 20th century, saving many lives through her intelligence and heroism.
Our big brains are super-efficient but glitchy. Scientists estimate that 90% of what we see, hear, smell, or sense never really sinks in. Instead, we pick up on the big things, general impressions, or important stuff and end up leaving our brains to fill in the missing info.
In this zany and vibrantly illustrated nonfiction guide to all things color, the origins of today's pigments come alive across continents and history, with oodles of art, tons of science—and extensive interactive backmatter!
Vaccination is one of humanity's most effective and greatest discoveries.
Infections like the plague, smallpox and other deadly diseases have affected and killed people for thousands of years, but the invention of vaccines forever changed our relationship with these diseases.
Young Adult
American Wings follows a group of determined Black Americans: Cornelius Coffey and Johnny Robinson, skilled auto mechanics; Janet Harmon Bragg, a nurse; and Willa Brown, a teacher and social worker. Together, they created a flying club and built their own airfield south of Chicago. As the U.S. hurtled toward World War II, they established a school to train new pilots, teaching both Black and white students together and proving, in a time when the U.S. military was still segregated, that successful integration was possible.
Born a Girl tells the stories of five girls from five different countries (Nepal, Afghanistan, Mexico, France and Kenya) and explores what it means to be a girl in those parts of the world.
In A Deathly Compendium of Poisonous Plants: Wicked Weeds and Sinister Seeds author Rebecca Hirsch takes you on a wild journey to look at how toxic chemicals in the natural world have been used for medicine, warfare, and sinister acts of foul play. Tread lightly as we explore these plants’ ominous deeds.
The powerful and fascinating story of the brave and dedicated young women who helped turn the tides of World War II for the Allies, with their hard work and determination at Bletchley Park.
In this non-fiction book for teens, acclaimed author and teacher Martha Brockenbrough guides readers through the development of this world-changing technology, exploring how AI has touched every corner of our world, including education, healthcare, work, politics, war, international relations, and even romance.
A heartrending graphic memoir about a young Jewish girl's fight for survival in Nazi occupied Poland, The Girl Who Sang illustrates the power of a brother's love, the kindness of strangers, and finding hope when facing the unimaginable.
With the passage of Title IX in 1972, the doors opened for young women to play sports at a higher level. But for the women on the U.S. Women's National Soccer Team, being able to compete at an international level didn’t mean fair treatment and fair compensation.
In their comics debut, Theo Parish masterfully weaves an intimate and defiantly hopeful memoir about the journey one nonbinary person takes to find a home within themself.
This book will ferry you across a river of uncanny tales, from classic folklore to contemporary urban legend. So, check the closet, make sure the skies are clear and delve in if you are ready to imagine the strange.
1971. Brooklyn, New York. Undercover cop Frank Serpico is knocking on a drug dealer’s door. His partners are there to back him up, but when the door opens, he’s staring down the barrel of a gun—and his partners are nowhere to be found.
In the spring of 1992, after a jury returned not guilty verdicts in the trial of four police officers charged in the brutal beating of a Black man, Rodney King, Los Angeles was torn apart. Thousands of fires were set, causing more than a billion dollars in damage. In neighborhoods abandoned by the police, protestors and storeowners exchanged gunfire. More than 12,000 people were arrested and 2,400 injured. Sixty-three died.
This final, essential chapter in Rex Ogle’s memoir trilogy recounts being forced from his home and living on the streets after his father discovered he was gay.
After millions of people died during World War I and from the 1918 influenza pandemic, the popularity of Spiritualism soared. Desperate to communicate with their dead loved ones, the bereaved fell prey to extortion by fraudulent mediums and fortune-tellers.
A genre-breaking collection about Black girlhood, The Unboxing of a Black Girl employs memory, poetry and prose to examine the way the world raises and upends, encourages and discourages young Black girls.
Wildfire is a natural process that takes place worldwide. In dry conditions, a single spark can transform into a megafire that sweeps across the landscape, burning everything in its path. Despite fire’s deadly reputation, ecosystems such as forests and grasslands depend on it to clear out debris and promote new plant growth.