California Florida Illinois New York Pennsylvania Texas

Gr 2—3—The visuals definitely take a front seat in these brief state profiles. On each spread big, sharply reproduced full-page or -spread photographs dominate the view, with more pictures in a border running below. The main texts, printed in blocks that float obtrusively on the large photos, offer a sugary selection of random facts, boilerplate generalities ("New York is usually warm in the summer. But winter can be cold and snowy"), or fatuous lines such as, "California has lots of fun places for everyone!" Even the sparse information given is not always accurate ("Comedian Bill Cosby was from Pennsylvania, too"), labels on the physical maps in each volume are too small to read comfortably, and, though these books are aimed at a younger audience than the publisher's "This Land Called America" series (2008), some of the same photos appear in both series.