Atlas of Miniature Adventures: A pocket-sized collection of small-scale wonders

by Emily Hawkins, Lucy Letherland (Illustrations)

Discover the world's smallest adventures with this beautifully illustrated journey around the world from the award-winning team behind Atlas of Adventures. Explore seven continent maps and learn about the best small-scale adventures on Earth - whether you're taking a ride on the world's largest miniature railway, sending a letter with the wolrd's smallest post office or cruising coral reefs with the smallest seahorse, this book brings together coolest miniature adventures from the four corners of the globe.

Genres: Nonfiction, Picture Books, Childrens, Juvenile, Travel

64 pages, Hardcover

Published March 3, 2017

About the author

Once a children’s book editor, Emily Hawkins is now a full-time author. Her work has been featured on the New York Times bestseller list (Oceanology, 2009) as well as winning the Children’s Travel Book of the Year Award (Atlas of Animal Adventures, 2016). Along with her background in children’s non-fiction Emily has a strong interest in myth, folklore and storytelling. In 2020 she wrote A Natural History of Fairies, which has been translated into twelve languages, selling more than 100,000 copies worldwide. Emily holds a first-class English degree from Nottingham University, and lives in Winchester, UK.

You can find her on Instagram @emilyhawkinsbooks.

Reviews

[Kathryn · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 STARS This is a fun and interesting concept, I just think it's a bit too limited. As you'll learn from this book, being miniature doesn't necessarily equate to lacking in detail (just look at Tiny Ted, the world's smallest teddy bear, only 4.5 millimeters high but sewn the same as a real teddy bear with jointed arms and legs!) and the book does a good job of giving details about the places/objects/creatures they chose to include BUT I felt like a lot more could have been included.

The maps of different regions mention miniatures that are never addressed later in the book -- so I guess you could take to the internet and look them up, but it's just a bit too much of a tease to have them on the map and not give them the spotlight elsewhere.

The focus also just seems a bit too narrow at times considering the vast regions covered. For example, for the entire region of Asia and the Middle East the author highlights Japan twice(the Omiya Bonsai Village and Kyoto's Netsuke Museum) but mentions nothing from the Middle East (not even on the map -- is there really nothing miniature in all of the Middle East!?) and rounds out with the World's Smallest Teddy Bear in South Korea and the Smallest Seahorse in the World from Indonesia. For North America we only get minatures in the USA -- nothing in Canada or Mexico. For Central and South America we only get miniatures on islands.

I also wish there were some actual photographs (though the illustrations are okay except I really didn't like the illustrations of the kids). What's here is decent enough to pique the interest, I suppose. Note there is no back matter or suggestions for further reading so you'll have to do your own research if you want to know more.

Here are the miniatures discussed in the book (not counting those simply mentioned on the map):

EUROPE
Bekonscot Model Village (England)
Maudrodam (Holland)
Black Light Minigolf (Germany)
Musée Miniature (France)
Perzy Snow Globe Museum (Austria)

AFRICA
World's Smallest Primate (mouse lemur -- Madagascar)
Smallest Tortoise in the World (speckled padloper -- Namibia and South Africa)

NORTH AMERICA
Northlandz Model Railway (New Jersey, USA)
Fairy Castle (Chicago, IL, USA)
World's Smallest Butterfly (pygmy blue -- SW USA)
World's Smallest Postal Service (San Francisco)


CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICA
Littlest Lizards in the World (dwarf gecko -- Dominican Republic)
Smallest Bird in the World (bee hummingbird -- Cuba)

ASIA AND THE MIDDLE EAST
Omiya Bonsai Village (Japan)
Kyoto's Netsuke Museum (Japan)
World's Smallest Teddy Bears (Teddy Bear Museum, South Korea)
Smallest Seahorse in the World (Satomi's pygmy seahorse -- Indonesia)

AUSTRALASIA AND OCEANIA
World's Smallest Frog (Papua New Guinea)
Desert Goby (Australia)

ANTARCTIC
Antarctic Krill (Southern Ocean)

[Dana Al-Basha | دانة الباشا · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book might be small in size but it's remarkable in content. I LOVED the idea of it, the illustrations and tini adventures! The book shares with us that even the smallest aspects of this world as just as remarkable like the big things. Many of the things shared through the world are now on my list of places to visit like the underground glow-in-the-dark golf field in Germany, or the original shop of snow globes in Austria.

[Mehsi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Officieel gelezen in het Nederlands (maar na zoveel boeken te moeten toevoegen had ik geen zin meer om deze ook te doen). Heel erg leuk creatief boek over allerlei miniatuur dingen over de hele wereld. Het boek is opgedeeld in verschillende werelddelen. Eerst een kaart, en vervolgens 2 pagina's per miniatuur. Later heb je ook nog de optie om terug te gaan en verschillende dingen te vinden.
Zeker een aanrader!

[RumBelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an extraordinary around the world journey that featured some of the worlds biggest, small in stature wonders. Most of the places in here I had never heard of, so I learned many fascinating facts.

Each chapter was based on a continent, and it began with a map of that continent showing the small scale wonders to be found there. The one annoying thing about this book was, for example, the map would show 10 places, or object or animals, but the book would only highlight, and talk in depth, about 3 of them.

Some of my favorite items were:

The Fairy Castle - To be found in Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry, this castle like dollhouse was covered in rich materials. Diamond studded chandeliers, ermine rugs and silver accents. It was a beautifully constructed masterpiece.

Black Light Mini Golf - Found in Berlin, how much fun would it be to play mini- golf under black light!

Worlds Smallest Sea Horse - This incredibly miniature sea horse lives in coral reefs off Indonesia.

A really fun book, with a lot of interesting places, animals and objects.

[Brandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love the concept and the illustrations/design of this little book about little things and creatures, ranging from dollhouses and model trains, to glow in the dark mini golf, to a tiny species of seahorse that’s smaller than a penny. However, I wished there were photographs in addition to the illustrations, a bit less focus on tiny animals (they take up almost half the descriptive pages, when I really wanted to know more about miniatures I could visit someday) and a longer set of descriptive pages for each of the “small-scale wonders” listed on each map page - Basically, I wanted to know more! But I still loved the concept of this book!

[Gideon · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book is about the small unnoticed things in the world.