Everything Awesome About Space and Other Galactic Facts!

August 1, 2021

Gr 2-6-The third installment in Lowery's "Everything Awesome" series focuses on everything cosmic. Sections include the universe, the solar system, the stars, space rocks, and space exploration. The broadest section-space exploration-includes profiles of prominent figures in space exploration and important space missions amid a hodgepodge of other information. Readers will enjoy the silly jokes and drawing tutorials that are included at the end of the book. The illustrations are out of this world (pun intended) and extremely eye-catching. There are several spreads that include a larger illustration with more information about a single specific topic. Readers will love exploring each page to learn the secrets of the universe. The table of contents is thorough and there is a brief listing of resources that Lowery used to compile the book's information. The one drawback is the reuse of certain space jokes throughout. VERDICT A strong purchase for public and school libraries and for collections where other Lowery offerings are popular.-Kristin Unruh, Siersma Elem. Sch., Warren, MI

Copyright 2021 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 15, 2021
A charged-up roundup of astro-facts. Having previously explored everything awesome about both dinosaurs (2019) and sharks (2020), Lowery now heads out along a well-traveled route, taking readers from the Big Bang through a planet-by-planet tour of the solar system and then through a selection of space-exploration highlights. The survey isn't unique, but Lowery does pour on the gosh-wow by filling each hand-lettered, poster-style spread with emphatic colors and graphics. He also goes for the awesome in his selection of facts--so that readers get nothing about Newton's laws of motion, for instance, but will come away knowing that just 65 years separate the Wright brothers' flight and the first moon landing. They'll also learn that space is silent but smells like burned steak (according to astronaut Chris Hadfield), that thanks to microgravity no one snores on the International Space Station, and that Buzz Aldrin was the first man on the moon...to use the bathroom. And, along with a set of forgettable space jokes (OK, one: "Why did the carnivore eat the shooting star?" "Because it was meteor"), the backmatter features drawing instructions for budding space artists and a short but choice reading list. Nods to Katherine Johnson and NASA's other African American "computers" as well as astronomer Vera Rubin give women a solid presence in the otherwise male and largely White cast of humans. (This book was reviewed digitally.) A quick flight but a blast from first to last. (Informational picture book. 7-10)

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