Just Like Us!: Ants, written by Bridget Heos, reviewed by Klaudia Janek

Student Reviewer: Fred O.
Summary: This book is an informational book that relates the lives of ants to us humans, as to better help understand how ants function in their own society, and to give kids something to relate this information to. The book contains both real photographs of ants, as well as illustrations done in pen and ink, watercolor, and digital media, which portray the ants working doing different jobs, which are obvious due to the uniforms or tools that the ants are portrayed wearing and using. The book starts by covering how just like humans, ants live in communities, and describes how each colony has a queen ant and a lot of workers. The story also covers how ants have jobs that they work hard on, sometimes keeping them and sometimes switching jobs, and also how ants babysit their siblings and prepare dinner. The story also includes how ants farm both plants like fungus, and even other animals such as mealy bugs. The ants can also be seen building homes and making bridges or boats by sticking together in large clumps. The story also touches on how ants wage wars on each other's colonies.

Straight Talk for Librarians: The pictures in this book are very well done, and the bright colors and cartoon images would really capture a child’s attention. This is a good choice for a reader who might think that a non-fiction book is “boring” because it reads like a graphic novel and the illustrations make it funny. Overall the book does a very good job of teaching about the way that ant societies function in an effective way. An adult might be needed to help with some of the vocabulary. This book is a good independent reading choice. It is part of a series and the entire series would make a good purchase for a school library. The author shares her bibliography and that will help readers see how much research went into writing this book.