Brain: Our Nervous System, The

Summary: Did you know that your brain (yes, even yours) is roughly the size of a large grapefruit? Award-winning author Seymour Simon clearly and skillfully exposes the many wonders of the brain and nervous system in The Brain: Our Nervous System. Author of more than 150 children's books about science, including The Heart: Our Circulatory System, Muscles: Our Muscular System, and Bones: Our Skeletal System, Simon has a knack for piquing the curiosity of youngsters and clearly communicating scientific facts. The Brain, written for ages 8 and older, is a solid launching pad for further investigation of the organ that makes us who we are. Kids will love learning that our brains grow until we are 7 years old, that our spines have 33 vertebrae, and that our skulls are made of 28 bones. Large, full-color photographs and illustrations show the fascinating, if slightly nauseating, areas of the human brain--a positron computed tomography (PCT) photo, for example, shows the dramatically different levels of visual stimulation to the brain when your eyes are open or closed. Two to three paragraphs of large type per page, plus one full-bleed illustration per spread, help make The Brain just the right amount of information for one grapefruit-sized brain to take in. (Ages 8 and older) --Karin Snelson