Review: The Frog Scientist

The Frog Scientist by Pamela S. Turner
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book was written for a slightly older audience than I expected and thus the level of difficulty of the text and the descriptions were more advanced than I expected. So, I have tagged it as good for students a bit older than middle grades elementary. The book is semi-biographical and semi-scientific. The biographical parts capture the human interest side of science, the scientific parts elucidate some of the intricacies of scientific research. On the whole, it is well-balanced. I appreciate the little box at the end explaining that the real scientific research was a bit more complicated than the text could cover. There is also a glossary and a bibliography. And the photos throughout are also excellent.

I was interested in this book, because one of my book clubs read The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History and it begins with an extensive discussion of the problems with frogs dying out. This book doesn't mention the larger problem of many more species beyond just the many endangered frog species, but it is an interesting accompaniment, even if the audiences for the books are different.

Finally, it should be mentioned that this book includes quite a few people who are not white Caucasians. This would make an excellent choice for people who are looking to make their book selections more inclusive.

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