Gigantosaurus by Jonny Duddle

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While he definitely has a way with pirates, Jonny Duddle is such an amazing illustrator that I am always excited to see where he turns his focus when working on a new project (be sure to scroll to the bottom of the review to see Duddle's latest project - creating new 15th anniversary cover for UK editions of the Harry Potter books!) As his newest book Gigantosaurus proves, Jonny Duddle has a way with dinosaurs and the Cretaceous period as well!

Gigantosaurus is a re-imagining of Aesop's fable, The Boy Who Cried Wolf. In this case, it's the baby ankylosaurus, Bonehead who cries gigantosaurus. Duddle uses the final pages of Gigantosaurus to identify the dinosaurs in the book and tell readers that his gigantosaurus is actually a "scary dinosaur made up for this book." He goes on to note that there was an actual dinosaur a lot like it, the "Giganotosaurus," which was bigger than the T-Rex.


Gigantosaurus begins with four little dinosaurs, Bonehead, Tiny, Fin and Bill wanting to play out of sight of their moms. The moms warn them to beware of the fierce and wild gigantosaurus, cautioning, "With teeth as long as you are tall, he'd soon make a snack of one so small. His feet go STOMP! His jaws go CRUNCH! In the blink of an eye, you'd be his LUNCH!"


Bonehead convinces his friends that he should be the lookout and he perches himself atop a termite nest. At the slightest inclination (which, admittedly, are BOOMS, THUDS and THUMPS that would scare me) Bonehead yells, "It's the GIGANTOSAURUS!" and his friends go scurrying. When they finally get fed up with Bonehead and leave him alone, the Gigantosaurus show up with a gatefold spread that really gives you an idea of the size of this beast. Happily, Bonehead survives to lookout another day! And he does - the final page of the story shows a pteranodon flying in on the horizon . . .



Jonny Duddle's other picture books:



The Pirate Cruncher       The Pirates Next Door

Jonny Duddle was also chosen to update the covers of the Harry Potter Series of books for Bloomsbury, the British publisher of the series.




Kazu Kibuishi's updated covers for Scholastic, the US publisher!


When you buy the boxed set, you get this additional awesome illustration of Hogsmeade! 


And this image of Hogwarts when all the books are spined together!




And the back covers of the new editions...









Source: Review Copy

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