Dinosaur roar! by Paul Strickland

Ill. by Henrietta Strickland. 25th Anniversary edition. Macmillan Children's Books, 2019. ISBN: 9781509885398.
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Themes: Dinosaurs, Humour, Verse, Rhyme, Prediction, Comparisons. Celebrating twenty five years since its first publication, Dinosaur roar! continues to intrigue, delight and scare those small children who pick it up to read. All children thrill at the idea of dinosaurs, and learn their names quickly and easily, recognising their size, shape, colours and behaviour with accuracy.
In this book, each double page has several different dinosaurs pictured with the simplest text across the bottom of each page, telling the reader something about the animal. The opening pages, dinosaur roar and dinosaur squeak show a large toothed animal filling most of the left hand side page, while the next page has a much smaller animal. Each animal depicted will have the audience enthralled as they look at its fierce mouth and teeth, its scaly skin, long legs and clawed feet, prompting them to recognise the animal shown. They will also readily understand the differences between each animal and the words used to describe them. Turning the page is another noisy dinosaur with dinosaur fierce across the page and on the next a larger animal cowers, with the words, dinosaur meek. Children will love seeing the difference between the size of the animals and their fierceness, and understand the difference between the two opposing words presented on each page, while having fun predicting the rhyming word.
The images will delight younger readers, enjoying the humour, predicting the rhymes, and reprising all the animals on the last two double pages where their dietary needs are shown. Included in the endpaper is a fold out poster of the whole book which when put up will further extend the wonder of the book.
The illustrations are wonderful, full of fun, filling the pages with colour and movement, depicting these amazing animals with gusto. I love the slimy dinosaur, its hide dripping with slime and goo from its environment, prompting readers to ask where it lives. This is a wonderful book, subtly revealing information about dinosaurs and prompting discussion and research. Republished in conjunction with the Natural History Museum, London.
Fran Knight