The Boy Who Cried Wolf, but with dinosaurs, still, the illustrations are funny-the dinosaurs have great big eyeballs, there are many kinds of dinosaurs to recognize and identify. The last page has some facts about some bones (called Gigantosaurus) that were found in Africa and England. Maybe more info than a board book reader needs. ( )

Lively, colorful silliness young dinosaurs will enjoy. ( )

I have to say I thought this was a great book. It was not only about dinosaurs but it taught a lesson too. It took a moral from the old fable, The Boy Who Cries Wolf. In the story one of the baby dinosaurs named, Bonehead, claims he will be a great look for the Gigantosaurus that their parents warned them about. Unfortunately, Bonehead tends to warn them about every dinosaur he sees and then when the Gigantosaurus really comes no one believes him. His friends then think that Bonehead had been lunch for Gigantosaurus, but he was able to get away at the last minute. However, his friends still did not believe him when he told them a Pteranodon was coming.
The illustrations have to be the best part of the book. It feels like you are right back in the time of the dinosaurs with volcanoes, large rock formations, and overgrown trees and plants. The dinosaurs themselves are real like the Triceratops, Stegosaurus, and the Brachiosaurus. Then the little dinosaurs seemed almost like a caricature of real dinosaurs. There is a poster size page in the story that make the Gigantosaurus seem even bigger. This is definitely a book for dinosaur lovers.
Added to the great illustrations is the author’s use of onomatopoeia with words like stomp, crunch, thump, and thud. The use of these words brings the dinosaurs alive in the story. Mr. Duddle, the author, also uses repetition about the Gigantosaurus in the story and it keeps the reader looking for it. It goes like this:
“Beware my child of the
Gigantosaurus,
so fierce and wild!
His feet go STOMP!
His jaws go CRUNCH!
In the blink of an eye,
You’d be his LUNCH!”
Another great feature is the last page of the story where the author takes the time to include real dinosaurs with facts about them to give the reader a brief lesson on dinosaurs. Hopefully this will wet the appetite of the reader to want to learn more about dinosaurs.
The big idea of this story is that if you cry wolf one to many times when the time comes no one will believe you. It also shows that you should pick your own path and not follow what everyone else does. However, when you mix this with cute little dinosaurs and real dinosaurs it make for a great story. ( )