Thunder Underground

Starred review from January 16, 2017
Home to organisms, minerals, and buried treasure, the subterranean world is the subject of Yolen’s 21 poems, written in a variety of rhyming and nonrhyming forms. Masse’s crisp, gently textured mixed-media illustrations show a black girl and white boy imaginatively exploring what lurks beneath their feet, starting in the basement: “cables, pipes,/ the basic foundation,/ a storage,/ a story,/ the oldest page.” In subsequent poems, Yolen pays tributes to the natural (“Oh, to be an ant,/ neat, quiet, indifferent/ to anything but constant work”) and the man-made (“I like the sound the subway makes/ deep in its underground den”), as well as musing on lost cities, pirate treasure, and “magma pools/ Becoming rock/ When magma cools.” Blending creativity with scientific fact, Yolen’s poems appeal to readers’ imaginations and intellects alike. Ages 5–10. Author’s agent: Elizabeth Harding, Curtis Brown. Illustrator’s agent: Lori Nowicki, Painted Words.

February 1, 2017

K-Gr 3-"Beneath our feet,/a world apart,/is found our Earth's fast-beating heart./It keeps us living,/soil and root,/while up above/we eat the fruit." Twenty-one pithy poems focus on the world below in this well-designed volume. Bookended by two insightful poems and expanding on the word under (underground, understand, understood), all the verse in between explores under the house, the city, and the ground. Through a variety of poetic forms, readers will meet ants, worms, and moles; uncover buried history, cities, and treasure; and brush up on the science of magma, plate tectonics, and earthquakes. The text embodies wonder and factual information, piquing readers' interest along the way. The detailed illustrations, done in mixed media, tie the book together and provide little Easter eggs for kids to notice on every page. Back matter includes "Notes on the Poems: Both Scientific and Personal," which will help to engage readers with the topic in a more meaningful way.

Copyright 2017 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from December 1, 2016
Twenty-one poems that center on the uncommon idea of things "underground." On the cover, a black girl has her ear to the ground beside the roots of a large tree while a white boy cocks his head and listens. The premise of the collection is to encourage children to explore what is under their feet using imagination and wonder. Poems include a variety of forms from terse haiku to a ballad. Whether playful or serious, each poem honors the ability of young readers to navigate syntax, imagery, and wordplay. "Seeds," for example, spins a literary conceit: "This dot, / this spot, / this period at the end / of winter's sentence / writes its way up / through the dull slate of soil / into the paragraph of spring." Yolen's treatment of the underground is expansive, exploring natural subjects as well as a cellar, a subway, and the underpinnings of a city, and buried treasures from pirates' to fossils. Masse's mixed-media illustrations portray the imaginary points of view with aplomb, placing the same two children from the cover in settings both realistic and fanciful. In the backmatter, Yolen offers discursive notes on each poem, expanding on the science presented and her various inspirations. A thoughtful exploration of nature expressed in poetry that should open the eyes of children to unseen worlds. (Picture book/poetry. 6-10)

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January 1, 2017
Grades K-2 What's that sound underground? In this thoughtful collection, it can be anything from ants, to a basement, to the subway, to the roots of a tree, and anything in between. As with Yolen's other poetry offerings, readers are meant to take their time with these poems, lest they miss something, such as the vivid description of the subway that makes it seem like an animal traversing the city, or the wordplay in a poem about buried treasure. On the last page are Yolen's notes on each poem, including both facts and some personal insight. Masse's drawings of a boy and girl tell stories on their own, which nicely complement the verses. The warm, naturalistic illustrations of underground scenes and cutaways often contain an element of charming whimsy, such as when a family of bunnies falls asleep in a burrow cuddled up, or when a red-nosed mole curiously digs along. Great for either a school or public library, this collection illuminates the rich world of activity that goes on beneath our feet.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)