Cocoa Bean to Chocolate

August 1, 2007
K-Gr 3-Short chapters explain the steps necessary to produce each product. An interesting "Fun Facts" section, randomly placed, interrupts the flow of the texts. Back matter has a "Can You Guess?" page with two questions. Some of the answers are found in the books, but others introduce new concepts in need of explanation. For example, "Grass" asks, "Where does butter come from?" The answer is butterfat, but this term is not mentioned or explained anywhere else in the book. Captioned color photos or drawings appear on every spread and pair well with the narrative in most cases. Libraries owning Aliki's "Milk: From Cow to Carton" (HarperCollins, 1992) or Gail Gibbons's "The Milk Makers" (S & S, 1985) do not need the book on milk as both of these titles give a more thorough explanation of the process for the same audience, in a more entertaining format. Children may also prefer books like Jules Older's "Ice Cream" (Charlesbridge, 1984). Given the average quality of these series titles and the abundance of "from start to finish" books, Murray's titles are additional purchases."Melinda Piehler, Sawgrass Elementary School, Sunrise, FL"

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