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What Goes On in My Head? by Robert Winston is a tremendously entertaining children’s book about neuroscience and psychology and is the final book shortlisted for the Royal Society’s Young People’s Book Prize.

Read this book and you’ll find answers to questions such as “Are brains actually necessary?”, “Why do we rub sore bits of our body better?”, “What is more dangerous – sleep deprivation or food deprivation?” and “Is it always better to concentrate when you’ve got to make an important decision?”.

You’ll also learn about the chicken called Mike who lived for 18 months after having his head amputated, why it’s better to star gaze using your peripheral vision and why smells can powerfully evoke past memories.

If that’s not enough, whilst reading this book it will seem like you have your own magician in the room; What Goes On in My Head? is packed with activities that explore different aspects of brain behaviour and many of them had us gasping with amazement or trying them again because the illusion or effect was so powerful. For example you can learn how to see inside your own eyes, how to make someone’s arm spontaneously levitate (the myth of telekinesis is debunked, by the way), and why it’s so difficult to draw even a simple image when you look in a mirror.

What Goes On in My Head? is a fascinating, exciting read, packed with curious facts. And as you’d expect with a Dorling Kindersley book, it’s a lovingly produced physical object, rich in images.

If I were to find fault with this beautifully produced book it would the use of Robert Winston as the “celebrity” author. Yes, he’s a household name (at least here in the UK), but he’s not a neuroscientist nor a psychologist (human fertility is is area of expertise). It seems a shame that if you’re going to use a scientist presumably with the idea of giving weight to the content of a book, why not use a scientist who is an expert in the field. Of course the book was written in consultation with a neuroscientist, Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, and this leaves me wondering what Robert Winston actually wrote for the book. Additionally, Robert Winston was used as a figure head to promote the sale of a health supplement, the adverts for which were subsequently banned for breaching the ASA guidelines on “substantiation and truthfulness”, so for me personally, the use of his name to add “credibility” to this book backfires a little.

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**Warning: I wear my heart on my sleeve. This post has things to say and opinions (backed by science) to share.**

What’s the Point of Being Green? by Jacqui Bailey is the most depressing, worrying book I’ve read this year. It’s also the nonfiction book this year I wish all my blog readers and their kids would read.

What’s the Point of Being Green? tackles head on how you and I are slowly destroying the thing we rely on – our planet, our home, the Earth. It pulls no punches as it lucidly discusses the causes and catastrophic consequences of climate change and environmental destruction. It’s a message lots of people don’t want to hear, it’s a message lots of people outright deny, but it’s a message we all need to take on board and respond to.

With chapters on fossil fuels and their alternatives, the degradation of the natural environment and the concomitant impact on biodiversity (and why this matters), population growth, over-consumption and waste this book looks at the damage we’re doing from every important aspect.

And whilst it doesn’t shy away from the problems and their enormity, the book is packed with ways we can all make a difference with tips on how we can change our behaviour and why we should change our values, open our eyes and accept what is happening.

The book is brilliantly written for its target audience (fluent readers to 14, I’d say), with an urgency and liveliness that makes the book exciting and gives the reader a sense of empowerment; not only are the issues presented clearly, excitingly and thoughtfully, young readers will feel they can indeed make a difference.

M lapped the book up; she enjoyed retelling lots of facts she’d learned, and enjoyed even more “badgering” us to make changes suggested by the book, from collecting our shower water to reuse on houseplants to making sure we use lids on our pans when cooking.

The colourful illustrations, including lots of cartoons, are fun and although the book is jam-packed with information it is all presented in easy-to-enjoy chunks, great for both dipping in and out of, but also reading from cover to cover. There’s a glossary, well compiled index and a very useful list of organizations and websites to explore on the topics raised in this book.

This is a book with a powerful agenda. Some people won’t like that, but I love it. M loves it. It’s utterly depressing, compelling and essential reading.

In case you hadn’t guessed, the issues discussed in this book are ones very close to my heart. I’ve read the science, I understand what is happening, I’m frightened by the environmental changes that are taking place, but I’m trying my hardest to do what I can to keep the planet healthy for future generations.

That’s why we

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**Don’t forget to enter my giveaway to win a bookcase perfect for picture books. Click here and leave a comment to be in with a chance of winning**

The Icky, Sticky Snot and Blood Book by Steve Alton, Nick Sharratt and Jo Moore, one of the 6 shortlisted books up for the Royal Society’s Young People’s Book Award, was torn out of my hands as soon as I unwrapped it.

The frontcover has a big globule of squishy snot dribbling down it, all the illustrations are done by the instantly recognisable and widely loved Nick Sharratt, and the book is full of crazy, impressive, sometimes slightly icky pop-ups. You can see how this would appeal to a lot of children!

Under a cloak of grossness Steve Alton has snuck in a great deal of information about breathing, blood and bogeys. You can learn what bogeys are made of (and why it’s not a great idea to eat them), what pus is made from, and how far across the room your heart could squirt blood if you were to cut the main artery from it.

Yep, this book isn’t for the very squeamish (though many kids seem to enjoy being “squeemed” a little) but it’s exactly the sort of book I’d offer to reluctant readers or thrill seekers: Like a breathtaking fairground ride The Icky, Sticky Snot and Blood Book zooms along making your stomach squirm, inducing oohs and aahs and is lots of fun (if you like that sort of thing).

My girls certainly did enjoy this rollercoaster of a read, but if I’m being pernickity and trying to find a reason to rank it higher or lower any other book shortlisted for the Royal Society’s Young People’s Book Award it would be the paper engineering.

The pop-ups, flaps and tabs are great fun, but a few of them make reading the text rather difficult (for example, you have to half shut the book to read the text hidden behind the pop-out body) and whilst they’re all enjoyable, I don’t think they are all as clever as many of them are in the other pop-up book shortlisted for this prize, How the World Works. Rather than adding to the understanding of the issue being explored some are included for pure enjoyment purposes (for example the pop-up amusement park at the end). Fun and pleasure is no bad thing, but if the pop-up engineering can be informative as well as eyecatching so much the better.

Don’t get me wrong, The Icky, Sticky Snot and Blood Book is a super book, that will grab everyone’s attention. It’s informative, funny and just a little bit disgusting. This science b

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In my mini series reviewing the books shortlisted for the Royal Society Young People’s Book Prize 2011 next up is How The World Works by Christiane Dorion and Beverley Young

A pop-up book covering a wealth of ground, How The World Works is a tremendous introduction to topics as diverse as the solar system, evolution, plate tectonics, the water cycle, weather systems, photosynthesis and food chains.

Each double page spread covers one theme and explores it using exciting illustrations, illuminating paper engineering and and array of both key and intriguing facts presented in inviting, bite-sized portions. The illustrations have the rich colours and boldness you often see with Barefoot Books (though this is actually published by Templar). The short sections of text make this an undaunting book for young independent readers.

As well of plenty of flaps and tabs, there are lots of instances where the paper engineering really adds to your understanding of the topic under discussion. For example the big bang explosion is a brilliantly executed bit of fold out paper – simple, but very effective as it mimics an explosion. How the continents have drifted over time is beautifully illustrated with a flip book – by flipping the pages we can actually see the continents drifting from the supercontinent Pangaea about 200 million years ago to their current location.

Again, the paper engineering is put to exceptional use to illustrate what happens at different types of plate boundary; Andy Mansfield, the brains behind the pop-up aspect of this book, has created paper tricks that are not only great fun but, but informative and meaningful.

This book contains a subtle but consistent message about how we as humans are having an impact on the earth and what the consequences of our actions will be. In the section on carbon there are tips about how we can reduce our carbon footprint, whilst the pages devoted to how plants work draw attention to the problems caused by deforestation. In the discussion of ocean currents and tides we’re introduced to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, “an area of plastic rubbish twice the size of Texas” floating in the Pacific ocean, whilst when exploring the the planets, the large quantity of space junk orbiting the earth is highlighted. Not only does this book tell us how the world works, it also makes us think about how it’s beginning to break down.

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