Basher Science: Physics: UK Edition

Basher Science

by Dan Green, Simon Basher (Illustrator)

Imagine physics as a community full of wacky characters--the building blocks of the universe each with a unique personality. This book throws open the doors and welcomes you into their amazing world. From gravity to the theory of relativity, this unique book provides visual interpretations of complex concepts, designed to make learning physics easier and a whole lot more fun!

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Childrens, Physics, Reference, Picture Books, Read For School

132 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 1, 2008

About the author

There is more than one author with this name in the Goodreads' database.

Dan Green spent his first four years in Africa, until his family swapped the African sun for Welsh rain. He grew up an English-American hybrid in the heart of Wales and then went to Cambridge University to study geology. After college, he shipped out to Italy to chase a dream of rock 'n' roll stardom, wound up in Venezuela, where he became editor of the English language newspaper and survived a coup d'etat and most recently rode his motorbike across Europe to Morocco. Dan is the "voice of Basher" - the best-selling children's science series created by the graphic artist Basher (basherbooks.com/usa/home.html). He has also written humor books, comic strips for Horrible Histories and Horrible Science, and is the author of the Footprint Venezuela Handbook.

Visit his website and find out what he is up to:
www.dangreenbooks.com

Reviews

[Sophie Crane · Rating 5 out of 5]

an easy to read book with humour for all ages.

[Phil J]

Basher creates cute cartoon characters to represent physics concepts (density, mass, etc.) It's a fun idea, but the characters don't convey the concepts as well as I wanted them to. No activities contained.

[Prometheus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice colourful introduction to basic physics concepts for kids. A lot of effort spent by the authors to present concepts in accessible language and anthropomorphise the concepts/particles/forces/etc. Well worth the addition to a KiwiCo crate for the little folk in your life.

[Mary Overton]

Physics concepts given Pokeman-like identities, faces, & outfits.
My favorite physics concept has always been Entropy:
"I am the king of chaos - a mixed-up prankster who makes sure that energy always changes from useful forms to messed-up, spread-out forms. A renowned troublemaker, I'm the reason why things break and burn out, and I'll get you, too, in the end. Ultimately, I'll cause your body's cells to degrade and stop working properly and you'll die.

"I always increase, and I work in one direction only - things NEVER get neater unless you put in some effort. Gasoline has lots of potential energy tied up in its arrangement of atoms, but when it explodes, this stored energy is spread out irreversibly. The chaos has increased, so there's more of me. Hurrah! In short, I create havoc. This is why it's pointless cleaning your room - because the universe is working against you." pg. 36

[Tracy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good companion to Basher Science: Extreme Physics. A personified first-person narrative to example the basic principles of physics, mechanics, theory, and history. Each topic is a character telling the story of itself.

It might be best for advanced kids. Younger kids might not understand some of the allusions, but perhaps a great way for a kid and adult to discuss the book together and teach about the allusions.

[Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked this book a lot and it tought me a lot about physics. Hey now I know where the word laser came from. They just summarized it. The author who wrote this did a good job on describing the types of physics we have and how at the bottom its says when it got discovered. I didn’t like how it kept on saying “we kill humans”. I kinda made me feel oh i need to watch my back! But it is nice how they told us that this type of physics is dangerous.
Otherwise 5/5 good book if you love Science read it.

[Kate Hastings · Rating 4 out of 5]

--grades 4-8
--great for visual learners
--science principals are animated into characters and divided into “teams” based on the characteristics.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think that this book was really good and it did something if you didn’t know anything about matter. I would recommend this book to a friend and I would read it again. It does help you learn something and you can enjoy the photos.

[Mohammad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really great book about physics

[Damian · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would read this book again. I like the detailed facts about each topic. I like the funny little pictures that match the topics. This would be a great book to use for a project.

[Ellen O · Rating 5 out of 5]

its a good book, its cute and gives good information. My mom got this for me because I was failing science but now since I got the book Ive been understanding class more.,

[Shilo Quetchenbach · Rating 4 out of 5]

another good installment. kiddo enjoyed learning about it.

[Christopher.C · Rating 4 out of 5]

good

[Niall · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Physics” is a nonfiction book that illustrates and tries to explain the basic forces and laws of Physics. What this book does is it puts different forces of physics into easy to understand categories. Then it illustrates the force and it’s features while teaching you about it through an auto-biography form. The force itself explains what it does and how it interacts with other forces of physics. It also explains its properties both chemical and physical. It goes through this process until you’re done with the book. Hopefully once you’re finished, you will have learned something. But I didn’t.
Despite this book’s colorful illustrations, I couldn’t find myself learning anything and I quickly became bored with the book. I didn’t learn much because I really wasn’t interested in what it was saying, I felt like it was just repeating the same thing over and over. This book didn’t explain much of what it wanted to say. This book just keeps to the same formula for each and every page, presenting nothing new. All this and the fact that there were terrible jokes every sentence, made this book unenjoyable. So for that reason, I gave this book 2 stars. I would recommend this book to someone who wants to learn the basics of Physics, but not someone who wants to expand their knowledge of Physics.

[Shoumik Sakib · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are the type of person that is always curious on how things work the way they work then this is a great book for you. Physics is basically the study of matter and energy and how they interact with each other. This book explains all types of energy from sound waves to space plasma matter that absorbs energy. This book explains how energy can move. Physics also determines how fast an object can move based off of the speed, velocity, acceleration, and how the effects of gravity can take a toll. It teaches you about how Albert Einstein had perfected this by using the equation E=MC2. This equation states that energy is equal to mass times the speed of light squared. There are many other things you can learn from this book. I also like how they added in pictures so it is much easier to understand what they are talking about because the picture describes they point the book is trying to make. I also like how they added in fast facts at the bottom of the page, the facts are pretty interesting in general. I would recommend this book to anyone that is very curious about how and why things work.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

The vibrant covers in the “Basher Science” series are certainly attention grabbing! I can’t believe I missed out on these books. I am so glad we now have them in our collection. The creative and funny writing keeps you engaged in the subjects at hand. Comical names are throughout the book, such as Physics: Why Matter Matters! has chapter titles including “Old School”, “Hot Stuff” and “Electric Cuties.” The information is organized very well making it easy to absorb different science concepts. Each concept has a different assigned image. When reading this Physics: Why Matter Matters, I never thought fun and physics would fit together, but this book makes it happen! These are great for anyone trying to learn the basics of various science subjects, particularly middle schoolers and high schoolers.

[Marsha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm posting this review for Elly S. She wrote a wonderful review of this book that shouldn't go unpublished. Here's what she wrote....

"First off, I love these books and the entire series but of course, what do you expect from a book by Dan Green. This book gives a simple explnation with words. It explains things so easy readers will understand. This book lists every type and theory in the same format of the other books. This book and the others explains things from the theory persepctive and sounds like a human. The characters epxlains on its own and it's impossible for someone not to be charmed by this book.

I give it 4 out of 5 stars because it didn't have enough details in the beginning.

[S.N. Arly · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little more complicated than it's companion Biology:Life as We Know It, it is a good follow up and introductory textbook on physics for the younger croud. We held off on this one until our son was five. Some of the concepts are well beyond him (such as the different types of radiation), but it's a good place to start. We have also decided that all children should be introduced to quantum physics at this age. The concept of Schroedinger's Cat makes perfect sense to him!

Like the other books in this series, it is broken up into chapters or sections of similar concepts. Each concept or item gets its own two-page spread (for the most part). One page is a cartoon representation of the item or concept and the other is a simplified explanation for it.

[William Mckinney · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is my favorite science - related reading material by far. It is a great introduction to Physics and the way the world and Universe functions. One of it's most defining features is how it illustrates the subjects in a way that is inviting and easy to understand. In these categories, each page and it's contents are glorified with the use of the formatting, which is fascinating. The only problem I have with the book was it's in ability to go in depth about what the subjects are used for and how they actually work. This is one of the most recurring problem with children's literature. Overall, any one who would like a nice introduction into the world of Physics would benefit greatly by reading this book.

[William V · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book brilliantly tackles the often-intimidating subject of physics, making its core concepts approachable and genuinely exciting through its distinctive visual style. The charming personification of fundamental particles, forces, and principles provides an intuitive and memorable way to grasp abstract ideas, proving particularly effective for visual learners. However, while superb as an introductory guide for sparking initial interest, its simplified approach means it prioritizes conceptual understanding over detailed mathematical explanations or in-depth theoretical explorations. Despite this, for anyone seeking a fun, accessible, and highly effective gateway into the fascinating world of how matter and energy behave, this book is an excellent resource.

[Tak Yip LOW · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought that this book is one of the most simple ways to attain more knowledge about the physics of atoms and why things are the way they are. This book is a good book because it explains the many fundemental forces and objects that makeup the world we know today. Once you understand these basics you will be able grasp the truely hard things in physics (like the uncertainty of the universe - Quantum physics). However this is not advised for people who have already have gone on to other harder stuff as it will be a complete waste of time. I think it deserved 4.01 stars because it was a bit of a waste of time (and a space in my libary card!!!)

[Savion Stfleur · Rating 3 out of 5]

Even if you hate physics you will love this book. For starters I knew nothing about physics but with corny jokes and mind blowing facts I think this book could even help you pass your first physics practice test! I give this book a 3/5 becuse it didn’t have enough information for me containing only 3 paragraphs every page.

[Matthew 11-12 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book because it was like a study book for science. It talked about the stuff in our unit. It told facts about the words like how many amps a lightning bolt has. Another reason is they had a glossary in the back of the books to learn what some non-related words mean.

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite Christmas gifts from my parents. I love all the personalities each "element" (I don't know what else to call them).

I have to say that my favorite one is Anti-matter, but I love them all :)

[Diane Malikah Moomin Pinkston · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the easiest books I'm currently using to teach physics for the 6th and 7th grades. With it's elaborate personified animated illustrations, Basher and Green made physics a bit fun to learn. It's a highly recommended book especially for children who are visual learners.

[Ale Hardin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoy the fact that the author had the different things talk in first person. It is also enjoyable to read as a physics book. It is entertaining to people who want to study and it sticks in their head better.

[Roselyn Mathis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent introduction to this amazing science. Learning the study of energy and matter and how they interact. I've very much enjoyed it, this book was a needed fundamental step as I continue to learn more about Physics.

[Kimberly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very cute illustrations by Basher, and accurate science information!

[Tyas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very cool way of presenting matters and other concepts in physics, with great art!

[Nathaniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't know that osmium and iridium are the densest elements. I didn't know that Higgs Boson even existed!