Just Right: Searching for the Goldilocks Planet

by Curtis Manley (Author) Jessica Lanan (Illustrator)

Just Right: Searching for the Goldilocks Planet
Reading Level: 2nd − 3rd Grade

Do you wonder if humans are the only beings who wonder if they are alone in the universe?

Our sun is a star. In the night sky are all kinds of stars, and orbiting those stars are planets like the ones in our own solar system.

Could those planets have life like we do on Earth?

Planet Earth is not too big, not too small, not too hot, and not too cold. It's just right. Our very own Goldilocks planet . . . .

Follow a young girl as she explores these questions in this gorgeous book about the wondrous search for another Goldilocks planet.

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Hardcover
$19.99

Publishers Weekly

Readers join a brown-skinned girl with a polka-dotted backpack as she asks questions about the stars and visits a space museum, where she watches exoplanets careen overhead in a planetarium. In sweeping, inky art, Lanan captures the child's dawning awareness of the vastness of the universe. Manley's writing swings gracefully between factual descriptions ("Earth orbits in our solar system's 'habitable zone' ") and more lyrical observations: "All stars twinkle, but some stars also seem to wink at us... as if saying, 'I know a secret.' " Back home after the museum trip, the child considers the types of life-forms that might be out there. Richly informative prose and intimate yet expansive art show a child's contagious enthusiasm for the book's subject. Includes a timeline of astronomical discoveries and suggestions for further reading. Ages 5-9. (Jan.)

Copyright 2018 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.

School Library Journal

Gr 2-5—Beginning with the insights of astronomers such as Lucretius and Giordano Bruno and continuing with the observations of a fictional young black girl from the present day, this illuminating book examines the possibility of life on other planets. Manley presents scientific certainties and theories alongside the child and her family's trip to a museum. One spread features text about Earth-like exoplanets paired with illustrations of the girl gazing off open-mouthed at the promising habitable planet surface that exists, for her, beyond the walls of the museum. On some pages, she muses, "If someday we do find evidence of beings like ourselves, what could we do? ...We could send them art and poetry and music." The enthusiastic main character lightens what could be weighty scientific information, providing an entry point for newcomers. Lanan's pleasing, watercolorlike artwork moves between expansive visions of outer space and panels that highlight key concepts. VERDICT An ideal addition for libraries building or updating STEAM collections.—Elaine Fultz, Madison Jr. Sr. High School, Middletown, OH

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Review quotes

*"The enthusiastic main character lightens what could be weighty scientific information, providing an entry point for newcomers. Lanan's pleasing, watercolorlike artwork moves between expansive visions of outer space and panels that highlight key concepts. VERDICT An ideal addition for libraries building or updating STEAM collections."—School Library Journal, starred review

"Richly informative prose and intimate yet expansive art show a child's contagious enthusiasm for the book's subject." —Publishers Weekly

Curtis Manley
Curtis Manley's previous picture books include The Rescuer of Tiny Creatures, Just Right: Searching for the Goldilocks Planet, Shawn Loves Sharks, and The Crane Girl. His work has received a number of awards, among them a Nautilus Book Award, an SCBWI Golden Kite Honor, and a Science Communication Award from the American Institute of Physics. Curtis lives near Seattle with his wife, daughter, and cat.

Jennifer K. Mann is a prolific author and illustrator of books for children. Her book The Camping Trip received four starred reviews and was named an ALSC Notable Book, a Bank Street Best Children's Book of the Year, and an SCBWI Golden Kite Award finalist, among many other honors; she is also the illustrator of Alison James's Maple and Rosemary. She resides on the Puget Sound's Bainbridge Island with her husband, two children, six chickens, a cat and a dog.
Classification
Non-fiction
ISBN-13
9781250155337
Lexile Measure
1080
Guided Reading Level
-
Publisher
Roaring Brook Press
Publication date
January 29, 2019
Series
-
BISAC categories
JNF051010 - Juvenile Nonfiction | Technology | Aeronautics, Astronautics & Space Science
JNF051040 - Juvenile Nonfiction | Science & Nature | Astronomy
Library of Congress categories
Outer space
Astronomy

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