Bugs for Lunch/Insectos para el Almuerzo

February 1, 1999
Here's the buzz from this chipper picture book: though they may not be everyone's favorite dish, bugs make tasty treats for many creatures, even humans. In simple rhyming verse, Facklam (The Big Bug Book) offers a list of critters that regularly dine on insects: "If your lunch was a bug,/ Who could you be?/ Maybe a nuthatch/ At work in a tree... You might be a gecko/ Or maybe a mouse,/ Eating the insects/ In somebody's house." An illustrated glossary expands on these basics, providing a plethora of fun facts. Simultaneously crisp and airy, Long's (Hush Little Baby; Ten Little Rabbits) pen, ink and watercolor compositions capture the natural world in realistic detail. Many young readers will delight in the "yuck" factor of depictions of children eating grubs roasted over a campfire or serving up stir-fried dragonflies on rice. Ages 3-8.