Juvenile Nonfiction: Chasing Cheetahs, Sy Montgomery & Nic Bishop

Another of the Scientists in the Field series.

Chasing Cheetahs; the race to save Africa's fastest cats
Sy Montgomery, photography by Nic Bishop
ISBN: 9780547815497
Excellent photography and clear text explain the work done by cheetah conservationists.

I am really digging these field-science books.  If I had science information like this available when I was coming through school, I think I might have been motivated enough to suffer through the math necessary to follow up my desire to be a scientist.  These publishers are just killing it with these quality nonfiction titles.

On to the specifics.  We are introduced via words and photos to a conservation park in Namibia, where scientists work with locals to educate people about cheetahs, and to rehabilitate injured or orphaned cheetahs to return to the wild, or to be tamed enough to become ambassadors visiting schools and being shown off, or to remain semi-wild members of the preserve to help socialize new generations of orphans or the injured.

There is a lot going on, and the book is densely packed with information about how the cheetahs are tracked, fed, kept, and worked with, in addition to the work done with the locals to help position them on the side of the cheetahs.  (that last part involves a whole specialized dog-breeding program!)

Beautiful work, excellent information, and just another amazing nonfiction book that I'm proud to have in the collection to inspire a new generation of scientists and nature-lovers.

Juvenile Nonfiction: Lives of the Scientists, Kathleen Krull & Kathryn Hewitt

Lives of the Scientists: Experiments, Explosions (and What the Neighbors Thought)
Kathleen Krull, illustrated by Kathryn Hewitt
ISBN: 9780152059095
(Part of a series of "Lives of" books)

First off, I really don't like oversized bobble-head art, but despite that, the faces are well done and engaging, and the other (non-portrait) illustrations are even more attractive, done in a soft-edged realistic style.

Second, I really DO like the effort put into highlighting women scientists, and that they included scientists of color and from non Western backgrounds (although they could have done a bit better, in my opinion - it's still pretty heavily western-centric).

Here's the biographical breakdown, non-Western scientists in bold, and women in italics:

Zhang Heng
Ibn Sina
Galileo
Isaac Newton
William and Catherine Herschel
Charles Darwin
Louis Pasteur
Ivan Pavlov
George Washington Carver
Marie Curie
Albert Einstein
Edwin Hubble
Barbara McClintock
Grace Murray Hopper
Rachel Carson
Chien-Shiung Wu
James D Watson and Francis Crick (with an honorable mention of poor Rosalind Franklin in England)
Jane Goodall

The biographies are short and to the point, focusing on the mind-set (and often on the peculiar personal habits) of these varied scientists.  In addition to their scientific discoveries, the biography talks about their beliefs, their family and children (or lack thereof) the hardships they overcame, and how they died.  Each bio also tries to add a bit of levity by including some 'truth is stranger than fiction' tidbits about their lives.

The For Further Reading page is sadly just one page, but the resources included look solid and comprehensive.