Book Review: Monstrous: The Lore, Gore, and Science Behind Your Favourite Monsters

Monstrous: The Lore, Gore and Science Behind Your Favourite Monsters is a unique approach to learning about the sciences; making scientific fact relatable and easily digestible. This book of monstrously interesting facts appeals to monster-lovers of all ages!

What's Great!

There are so many things that we loved about this book, and it started with the intriguing cover illustrations - nothing draws you in to a book quite like a unique cover design and this one certainly grabbed our attention amongst some of the more mundane scientific books in the junior non-fiction section of the library.

Initially, I thought that it must have been a story that had been misplaced and picked it up to see if I could pop it back where it belonged…only to discover it was oh so much more!

Beyond the interesting cover design we loved:

The contents page as a timeline! Not only was it a super creative and visually engaging way to layout the contents page; it was a subtle reminder that this book was no story about fictional monsters – it was a factual exploration of the history and science behind these famous characters.

That the authors weren’t afraid to jump straight in to the technical stuff, the science terminology and explanations throughout the entire book were detailed enough to be accurate but not so content heavy to detract from the fun of the theme.

That each chapter explores a different ‘monster’, the historical and modern references to that monster and the science behind why that monster could or could not have existed. Incidentally, even though this book is all about monsters, it would go a long way to easing the fears of children who might be afraid that one of these creatures is about to jump out from under their beds (because it very matter-of-factly explains why these creatures are scientifically impossible)!

That this book reads like a story, with engaging illustrations and funny anecdotes throughout – but contains some brilliantly integrated scientific elements (including diagrams, technical terminology, interesting facts, statistics, procedures, and even an experiment or two).

That this book has all the hallmark features of a great non-fiction book: contents and index pages, glossary, bibliography AND that it squeezed in an incredible amount of quirky, fun activities too!

What I Didn't Like!

There truly wasn’t much we didn’t like about this book.

We’d love to see a lot more scientific books for young people modelled on this format into the future and we eagerly look forward to exploring other books by this author!

The key thing we didn’t like was that the book ended too soon!

Explorations Unlocked!

This book had the whole family enthralled from cover to cover and it really got our older kids thinking about science and creative writing. One of our younger children loves all things ‘spooky’ and spent lots of time looking at the interesting pictures and asking lots of questions – this was a great opportunity for us to start exploring the sciences with her and introducing fun science concepts that often aren’t explored until much later (probably, mostly due to the fact that there is very limited enticing and appropriate literature out there to begin explorations earlier – thank goodness for Carlyn Beccia and this book)! Topics explored in this book were:

The human brain
Electricity
Atoms
Famous Literature & Film
Historical Timelines
Genetics
‘Mad’ Scientists
Folklore
Death and Decomposition
Arteries and Veins – the Circulatory System
Optical Illusion
Light
Blood Types
First Aid
Cells & DNA
Animals & Animal Characteristics (e.g., what they eat/how they behave)
Viruses
Nutrition
Survival Preparedness
Mathematics (Volume, Area, Statistics, Graphing)
Evolution
Etymology
Body Language
Medical Conditions
Cosmetics (e.g., history of ambergris)
Cephalopods
Ocean Zones
Density and Buoyancy
Dwarfism & Gigantism
Scientific Field Work
Nuclear Energy & Radiation
Anatomy
Animal Classification
Geologic Scale

As you can see…this superbly fun book touches on a lot of content and opens the doors wide for further exploration. We found that this book engaged our kids unlike anything else we’ve read recently and allowed them to explore a lot of concepts quickly, and gave them a delightfully large menu of topics to choose from when deciding where they would like to take their explorations next…we hope that this book helps your family discover some interesting new learning journeys too!

What I Think About This Book

This book is a bridge from story and fantasy to science and fact; I highly recommend this book to families interested in exploring the sciences in an engaging way, those that want to rid their children of unhealthy fears of fantastical creatures, and those looking for ways to make science accessible even to children who are quite young. It is also a no-brainer when it comes to those that have a curiosity or passion for all things ‘monstrous’ and definitely gives monster-lovers young and old some interesting things to ponder. Although this book is very accessible to people of all ages and is quite a bit of fun; it does contain some concepts that might be confronting for some families or frightening for some young children without care taken to explore and explain the content. The publishers recommend this book for ages 9+ but it can definitely be explored with eager young scientists or monster-lovers below this age with support. This is definitely a book that is finding a home in our personal collection, so that we can revisit it again and again; it was tremendous fun!