Do You Love Bugs?: The creepiest, crawliest book in the world

By Author / Illustrator

Matt Robertson

Genre

Environment

Age range(s)

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing PLC

ISBN

9781526609519

Format

Paperback / softback

Published

02-04-2020

Synopsis

Crawly! Hairy! Maybe a bit scary? Snails slime upside down. Eeek! Worms can somersault and butterflies smell like cake. YUM. Wait, don't eat them... Because bugs are truly BRILLIANT! Matt Robertson's quirky text and sweet yet hilarious illustrations show exactly why minibeasts can be truly awesome in their own unique way.

The book includes 14 hilarious globally inclusive, bug-tastic spreads, featuring worms, bees, beetles, dragonflies, butterflies, moths, grasshoppers, spiders, ants, snails and stick insects. Find out how honey bees make their honey, why moths always fly around lamps and how bombardier beetles protect themselves from hungry predators. There's something new to learn about each bug. Did you know that stick insects can dance? Or that butterflies can smell like cake? And guess what? A grasshopper will spit on you if it gets angry! So always be good to grasshoppers, give spiders a smile not a screech and never get angry at ants!

There are so many more fun facts to uncover about our tiny furry and slimy friends. Winner of the Sainsbury's Children's Book Award for Learning & Development 2020.

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Reviews

What a wonderful non fiction book for budding young nature lovers. Do You Love Bugs? grabs your attention from the front cover to the very last page. The author has beautifully illustrated each page with cartoon bugs that give these overlooked creatures lots of character. Alongside these wonderful illustrations there are amazing facts... did you know that there is a worm out there that grows up to 7 metres long... taller than a giraffe?! (thankfully it's an African worm not an English one so don't go digging up mom's prized flowers to find one!) Spiders eat more insects than birds and bats!

I could go on but you need to delve into this book yourselves and I'm sure you will not be disappointed. The colourful, well laid out informative pages are suitable for 5-7 year olds. Do you love bugs? Would also be great for younger children, to read with their parents.

This book could be used in so many different ways... to read before you set off on a mini bug hunt to encourage children to see how many bugs they can find, and as an entertaining introduction to some of the bugs that are on our planet. It will encourage some children to explore further so would be great for a primary school nature day to get things started.

Do You Love Bugs? would be a great addition to the primary library, hopefully helping to convince young readers that bugs are good for the environment and are worth protecting. The message in this book is, stop and think before you step on a snail or a spider, there is much more to these bugs than you think!

Picture book / Ages 4+ / Reviewed by Linda Brown, school librarian