Dinosaurs: A Visual Encyclopedia

Smithsonian Visual Encyclopedia

by D.K. Publishing

Kids can go on a visual tour of the prehistoric world, exploring the plants, the reptiles, the swimmers, the flyers, the dinosaurs, the mammals, and more in this comprehensive and fully updated visual celebration of prehistoric life.

Dinosaurs is not simply a catalog of facts--it is a visual celebration of the history of all life on Earth, with a special focus on dinosaurs. It features more than 100 dinosaur species, many illustrated with exclusive, brand-new artworks. The new images vividly reflect the very latest research into what these prehistoric creatures looked like, including stunning new discoveries about feathered dinosaurs. Material is organized by category of animal: invertebrates, early vertebrates, dinosaurs and birds, and mammals.

Genres: Dinosaurs, Science, Nonfiction, Reference, Childrens, History, Nature

304 pages, Paperback

First published June 20, 2011

About the author

Dorling Kindersley (DK) is a British multinational publishing company specializing in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 62 languages. It is part of Penguin Random House, a consumer publishing company jointly owned by Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA and Pearson PLC. Bertelsmann owns 53% of the company and Pearson owns 47%.

Established in 1974, DK publishes a range of titles in genres including travel (including Eyewitness Travel Guides), arts and crafts, business, history, cooking, gaming, gardening, health and fitness, natural history, parenting, science and reference. They also publish books for children, toddlers and babies, covering such topics as history, the human body, animals and activities, as well as licensed properties such as LEGO, Disney and DeLiSo, licensor of the toy Sophie la Girafe. DK has offices in New York, London, Munich, New Delhi, Toronto and Melbourne.

Source: Wikipedia.

Reviews

[Audrey's Picture Books · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is absolutely the definitive children's book on prehistoric creatures. It calls itself a book on dinosaurs, and there is an extensive dinosaur section, but it is really a comprehensive view of prehistoric life in general. It has excellent sections on early mammals and other prehistoric animals. It incorporates the discoveries that have made so many children's dinosaur books obsolete in recent years. Moreover, it is organized in a way that intrinsically educates children about how paleontologists think about prehistoric animals. Instead of having a spread for tyrannosaurus rex or hadrosaurus, it dedicates spreads to tyrannosaurids and hadrosaurs as dinosaur groups. This means that the book doesn't talk down to children. Finally, the illustrations are beautiful and engaging, while also being up to the latest science. It's a book that fifth graders and preschoolers can both love--the former for its scientific detail and the latter for its captivating illustrations.

[Hayley · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I was a 12 year old kid and loved dinosaurs this book would be my prized possession. Unfortunately, I am 45 but I still really loved the book. It is aimed at a younger audience in the DK Series who are renown for their educational books. It was excellent to read as an adult as well and basically made everything easier to understand unlike some non fiction adult books which can either be a bit technical or dry or both.

The illustrations in this, make it a book that you want to come back to time and time again. Another bonus is that it is not just dinosaurs. You get a large number of birds, vertebrates, invertebrates pre dinosaurs and then mammals and the human race(which are mammals)

This was a fantastic book that I read from cover to cover in a day.

[Lindsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Informative and well laid out.

[Jamie Bee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vibrantly Visual Middle-Grade Dinosaur Book

So many children are crazy about dinosaurs! This DK Publishing book, done in conjunction with the Smithsonian, is intended for middle-grade children. I love books by this publisher—both for children and adults—as they are well researched and formatted beautifully. This book is no exception and is vividly colorful and inviting, filled with photographs and drawings of actual places and fossils (along with illustrations of other things mentioned). If you have a young child in your life who is fascinated and enthralled by all things dinosaur, she or he may enjoy this book! Heck, if you are interested in dinosaurs, you may like this as well!

I'm not the only one who likes this book! It's so rare for a book to get over 3000 ratings at Amazon ... and be rated a solid 5 stars!

[Carlos Hernandez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is not only about dinosaurs but also about extinct animals and any thing that was around in the dinosaurs era. This tells us about important key facts about dinosaurs like the weight height and what they eat. Furthermore it gives us background information and tell us if that species has any living relatives today.In addition this book tells us readers about fossils. last but not least it tells is about what some things that are happening today. also paleontology brought us a lot of the info.

One theme in this book is even the greatest things fall one day. These great creatures died even though they way bigger than us. As a whole I enjoy the book because its well organised and gas a lot info. I would recommend this book to people who don't know about dinosaur or want to kearn more about them. On a side note this book reminded me of jarrasic park because of dinosaurs.

[Brittany · Rating 4 out of 5]

A visually stunning encyclopedia of dinosaurs and other early life. Full of updated information and beautiful graphics. I do question a bit of the organizational tactics in this book, it isn't exactly easy to see all the life from various periods grouped together, they are quite scattered throughout, but clearly labeled otherwise. For a prereader this could cause difficulty in understanding which creatures lived together and which did not, but aside from that this book is awesome. It has quickly become a favorite book in our household and homeschool lessons!

[DatSheffy · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a visual encyclopedia about "Dinosaurs", it really dedicates an excessive amount of space to everything non-dinosaur, especially invertebrates. Unfortunately, the quality is just not there, and the artwork suffers, significantly. This one does not seem to posses DK's magic touch. I would not recommend it.

Instead, as a greater alternative, you can check out "Knowledge Encyclopedia: Dinosaur!".

[Whole And · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful source for the dinosaur lover, broken down in categories that clarify the large variety of dinosaurs that existed.

[Allyna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great illustration and insightful knowledge on dinosaurs.

[Kyla Stan · Rating 5 out of 5]

a fantastic book to learn about our planet's prehistoric history!
Features many awesome animals and time periods.