Velociraptor and Other Small, Speedy, Meat-Eaters: And Other Small, Speedy Meat-Eaters (Schomp, Virginia. Dinosaurs.)

Rating:
Summary: A solid introduction to the "Spielberg" dinosaurs
Review: The most enduring legacy of the film "Jurassic Park" is that it made a dino-star out of the Velociraptor. Thus we find this Prehistoric World series devoting an entire volume to the "Velociraptor and Other Small Speedy Meat-Eaters," just like the standard favorites of kids all around the world, the Tyrannosaurus, the Triceratops, and the Apatosaurus. The attraction to this particular group of dinosaurs and their uniqueness is captured in the opening pages of Virginia Schomp's book where there is a photograph of the famous "fight dinosaurs" fossils that preserved the life-and-death struggle of a Velociraptor and its Protoceratops prey. Being able to see a fight like this eighty million years later is pretty compelling.

When you read one of these books by Schomp the emphasis is clearly on a scientific approach. Young readers will learn that Velociraptors are of the suborder Theropods, the infraorder Tetanurans, and the family Dromaneosaurs, which includes the genuses Deionychus and Dromaeosaurus. There are also Theropods that were twice as big as the Velociraptor. There are less than a dozen different types of small predators covered in this book, for which young readers will learn where and when the creature lived, and such charming facts as teh Compsognathus had a skull 2 1/2 inches long while the Coelophysis sometimes ate its own young. Then there is the Sinosauropteryz, a small dinosours that was covered with hairlike feathers that paleontologists see as being evidence of the link between ancient dinosaurs and modern birds. These books may well not only continue a child's interest in dinosaurs, but direct it toward a more scientific rather than cinematic understanding.

Rating:
Summary: A solid introduction to the "Spielberg" dinosaurs
Review: The most enduring legacy of the film "Jurassic Park" is that it made a dino-star out of the Velociraptor. Thus we find this Prehistoric World series devoting an entire volume to the "Velociraptor and Other Small Speedy Meat-Eaters," just like the standard favorites of kids all around the world, the Tyrannosaurus, the Triceratops, and the Apatosaurus. The attraction to this particular group of dinosaurs and their uniqueness is captured in the opening pages of Virginia Schomp's book where there is a photograph of the famous "fight dinosaurs" fossils that preserved the life-and-death struggle of a Velociraptor and its Protoceratops prey. Being able to see a fight like this eighty million years later is pretty compelling.

When you read one of these books by Schomp the emphasis is clearly on a scientific approach. Young readers will learn that Velociraptors are of the suborder Theropods, the infraorder Tetanurans, and the family Dromaneosaurs, which includes the genuses Deionychus and Dromaeosaurus. There are also Theropods that were twice as big as the Velociraptor. There are less than a dozen different types of small predators covered in this book, for which young readers will learn where and when the creature lived, and such charming facts as teh Compsognathus had a skull 2 1/2 inches long while the Coelophysis sometimes ate its own young. Then there is the Sinosauropteryz, a small dinosours that was covered with hairlike feathers that paleontologists see as being evidence of the link between ancient dinosaurs and modern birds. These books may well not only continue a child's interest in dinosaurs, but direct it toward a more scientific rather than cinematic understanding.