Yong, Ed. An Immense World: How Animals Sense Earth’s Amazing Secrets, Young Readers Edition. Rebecca Mills, Illus. Addl. Creator AnnMarie Anderson. Bright Matter, 05/2025. 272pp. Nonfiction. Trade $24.99. 978-0-593-81088-0. PLB $27.99. 978-0-593-81089-7. GRADES 5–8. HIGH ADDITIONAL.
We know the world through our senses, but that is a mere slice of reality. Exploring the perceptions of other animals reveals an unimagined and immense world. Twelve chapters explore animal senses, typically opening with the author interacting with an animal and the researcher who studies it, giving readers a powerful sense of how cutting edge much of this knowledge is. Each titled chapter is subdivided into helpfully specific sections. Well-crafted prose, plenty of metaphors, and jokey asides help create context, allowing readers to imagine what is beyond our range of experience. Color blocking, field notes, puzzlers, emboldened quotes, and words to remember help to break up the text. Photographs, line drawings and frequent full-color illustrations add interest, but the heavily digitized artwork seems discordantly bland in a work exploring diverse specificity. Back matter includes author’s note, photo credits and index, but no sources or further reading. Review based on an ARC.
Melissa McAvoy—Retired