The Wonderful Wisdom of Ants

January 1, 2024
Grades 1-3 For fans of Bunting's googly-eyed trees in The Gentle Genius of Trees (2023) comes this follow-up fittingly featuring bug-eyed ants. Once again, the Australian author-illustrator blends wordplay, speech bubbles, and humor with solid information to introduce ant life and explain how these insects benefit the planet. For instance, there are 10 quadrillion ants on Earth (so many that all the zeros needed to express this number stretch onto a third page!). Other quick, lively facts include what ants love and don't love, like "anteaters (obviously)," and their life cycle. The emphasis, however, is on the social nature of ants, particularly how they live and work together in colonies and their roles within them; how these insects communicate through pheromones; and how they are super recyclers, eating and pooping plant nutrients to create richer soil. Throughout the book, cartoonish illustrations set against colorful backgrounds not only encourage engagement but also provide visual aids to the concepts presented. Bunting concludes with more life lessons humans can glean from ants' community spirit.

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February 1, 2024
An amiable introduction to our thrifty, sociable, teeming insect cousins. Bunting notes that all the ants on Earth weigh roughly the same as all the people and observes that ants (like, supposedly, us) love recycling, helping others, and taking "micronaps." They, too, live in groups, and their "superpower" is an ability to work together to accomplish amazing things. Bunting goes on to describe different sorts of ants within the colony ("Drone. Male. Does no housework. Takes to the sky. Reproduces. Drops dead"), how they communicate using pheromones, and how they get from egg to adult. He concludes that we could learn a lot from them that would help us leave our planet in better shape than it was when we arrived. If he takes a pass on mentioning a few less positive shared traits (such as our tendency to wage war on one another), still, his comparisons do invite young readers to observe the natural world more closely and to reflect on our connections to it. In the simple illustrations, generic black ants look up at viewers with little googly eyes while scurrying about the pages gathering food, keeping nests clean, and carrying outsized burdens. Lighthearted and informative, though the premise may be a bit stretched. (Informational picture book. 6-8)

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

March 1, 2024

K-Gr 3-Told with humor and short phrases, this is a highly engaging nonfiction for young etymologists. All ages will enjoy this book as some of the fun is geared more toward adult readers, e.g., "before you can say, 'Bob's your ant!'" Comparing the ant's world with the human realm will help children connect with these small creatures. They may ask adults to think twice about getting rid of that ant invasion in the home after reading about the amazing way ants communicate by using pheromones. Who would have thought ants had such important life lessons to teach humans? Bunting's pitch-perfect renderings and graphic images complement the simple text; they're highly appealing and reminiscent of the illustrations in John Kane's I Say Ooh, You Say Aah. VERDICT A fun new addition for all collections.-Heidi Dechief

Copyright 2024 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 1, 2024
This overview of ants combines cleverly designed graphics and a funny text to convey major concepts about the familiar insects. Expressive-eyed ants march across the pages, first in a show of their large numbers and then to illustrate key ant behaviors. These are succinctly introduced as "Ants love: Family. Micronaps. Recycling. Helping others. Being caught on camera carrying stuff way bigger than they are." Descriptions of ant colonies, cooperation, communication, and ants' role in creating soil follow. The page design is thoughtful and effective; one especially impressive double-page spread describing how ants communicate through pheromones features a sequenced scenario in which doughnut sprinkles are encountered by a single ant, who then leaves a pheromone trail to communicate the food location to the colony. Humorous yet still scientifically spot-on phrases pop up throughout ("Drone. Male. Does no housework. Takes to sky. Reproduces. Drops dead"). The final pages connect ant behaviors to another social species -- humans -- so that readers can be like ants and "leave the Earth in better shape than it was when you got here." Danielle J. Ford

(Copyright 2024 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

October 15, 2019
Ants. What exactly do these tiny, easily overlooked creatures have to teach us? Quite a bit, according to Philip Bunting, whose picture book is funny and informative as he goes about telling us some factoids about these animals who are otherwise barely considered by the human population. According to the book there are roughly 10 quadrillion ants in the world, and to clarify this preposterous number Bunting draws individual ants holding up zeros (there are many, many zeros). He also lists some of their favourite and not so favourite things. The former category includes: family, micronaps and ‘being caught on camera carrying stuff way bigger than they are’. The latter category? Boots, magnifying glasses and anteaters (obviously). Bunting explains their sense of community, how they go about setting up a colony, the types of ants in a colony (readers will find out that all the females have the power in this set-up), as well as how they communicate through smells and not sounds, among other things. Bunting uses humour to good effect as he shows us how ants can teach us to be better people (‘Reuse or recycle everything. Waste nothing’). Best for primary schoolers, The Wonderful Wisdom of Ants is full of educational snippets and teaches almost by stealth.

Thuy On is a freelance arts journalist and reviewer, and the books editor of the Big Issue

January 1, 2024
This overview of ants combines cleverly designed graphics and a funny text to convey major concepts about the familiar insects. Expressive-eyed ants march across the pages, first in a show of their large numbers and then to illustrate key ant behaviors. These are succinctly introduced as "Ants love: Family. Micronaps. Recycling. Helping others. Being caught on camera carrying stuff way bigger than they are." Descriptions of ant colonies, cooperation, communication, and ants' role in creating soil follow. The page design is thoughtful and effective; one especially impressive double-page spread describing how ants communicate through pheromones features a sequenced scenario in which doughnut sprinkles are encountered by a single ant, who then leaves a pheromone trail to communicate the food location to the colony. Humorous yet still scientifically spot-on phrases pop up throughout ("Drone. Male. Does no housework. Takes to sky. Reproduces. Drops dead"). The final pages connect ant behaviors to another social species -- humans -- so that readers can be like ants and "leave the Earth in better shape than it was when you got here."

(Copyright 2024 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)