Review of "100 Most Feared Creatures," by Scholastic Inc.

Review of

100 Most Feared Creatures, by Scholastic Inc. ISBN 9780545563420


Five out of five stars

 This book containing short descriptions of animals that pose a danger to humans is at times very scary. Although it is admitted that dangerous contacts with such animals are rare, phrases like, “Geographer cone venom is so powerful that just one snail is capable of killing 700 people,” are truly scary.

 The creatures in this book are dangerous in many ways, from injecting poison to slicing and dicing to simply trampling you. Children are especially vulnerable, for they grow up seeing human-like animals in cartoons and movies. While most creatures will go out of their way to avoid humans, there are some that will attack with no provocation and all will attack if their young are threatened.

 The tiger is unique among cats, for there are known instances where a tiger has deliberately hunted humans for food. Most frightening are the parasites, only a few of which are mentioned in this book. I took a college course in parasitology and it is unnerving to read the accounts and see the pictures of some of the infected people.

 This is a book that children can read in order to get a fright, and unlike what appears in movies, the “bad guys” in this book are real and can be encountered.