Science Year by Year: A Visual History, from Stone Tools to Space Travel

Gr 5–8—This browsing item offers select highlights in the progress of science and technology, from the 3.3 million–year–old stone tools discovered near Kenya's Lake Turkana to the flight of the James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled for 2018. Select is the key word here, as the discoveries and inventions flanking the time line ribbon that runs across the middle of each page never result in a crowded look. The designer does take occasional liberties—misleadingly putting a photo of a Japanese ceramic pot from the middle Jomon period in an incongruous place on the time line, for instance. Overall, however, the bright, inviting mix of color pictures and concise commentary, enhanced with cross references and frequent breaks for more in-depth examinations of significant advances or figures, will give readers a good sense of what (or who) came along when. A closing "Reference" section adds scattershot but informative overviews of modern sciences and major scientists of the past.