Coral Reefs (review)

Information and fantasy collaborate in this imaginative introduction to coral reefs. Here readers can get "just the facts" on the structure, life cycle, and marine denizens of reefs, with the expected data on the polyps that build them and the forces (natural and man-made) that imperil them. As the well-organized text proceeds, however, the accompanying illustrations take readers on a little girl's wild journey from the reading room at the New York Public Library (its ornate ceiling cleverly transformed into marine motifs), where she pulls Chin's book from the shelf. As she strolls the aisles perusing the picture book, coral formations build in her wake, water presses out the library windows, and she's underwater at a reef that has taken over the city streets. Just another reader figuratively "immersed" in her book? Maybe not, since she emerges from the library dripping wet, with shards of coral in puddles on the steps, and a band of intrigued kids anxious to share her book—and, no doubt, her fabulous experience. Some adults may fear that the illustrated story is sufficiently distracting to endanger the delivery of information, but it's more probable that kids will just revisit the material until they've wrung what they need from pictures and text. Additional notes and a short bibliography are included, and endpaper sketches identify many of the fish and coral presented throughout the book.