1. Odd old Mammals: Animals After the Dinosaurs is an informational poetry picture book written by Richard Armour, illustrated by Paul Galdone, and published in 1969 by Littlehampton Book Services. I have mixed feelings toward this book. I liked the writing of the book and that it pushes readers to think of how mammals have evolved through the years, but the illustrations seemed very dull and plane at some points. My favorite poem in the book is the Hyaenodon poem. This poem is about a Hyaenodon, the ancestor to today’s Hyena. The writing of the poem flows very well and automatically creates a beat in my head to follow along the rhyming scheme of the poem. An example of this is the second to last paragraph of the poem “Hyaenodon had just one rule Kept firmly in its head, to wit: ‘Fight only smaller beasts or those already dead.” This part of the poem has a very easy flow to it. The words come after each other very smoothly and precisely. The writing describes why the Hyaenodon only goes after smaller prey or dead animals. This flow and descriptive writing helped me to put the poem to a beat in my head that helped me to read the poem at a fast pace while understanding what was going on. My favorite part of the book is how each poem tries to relate the early mammal to its modern day counterpart. This helped me the reader to think about how the animal evolved and how it survived. There is a line in the poem that reads “More Grizzly bear in size Than like todays hyena, he acted quite hyena-like.” This line pushed me the reader to think of the modern day hyena, its traits, and how it could be like the Hyaenodon. I also tried to picture the Hyaenodon standing next to a hyena and its height differences. The great detail in the poem helped me to think of how the Hyaenodon compared to the Hyena. I liked this poem but I dislike the poems illustration. This poems illustration seems to be done in pen with fine ink marks. There is some detail on the Hyaenodon but there is little else in the background. Sadly this is true through the book. Some illustrations are good with a lot of detail but the majority of illustrations are lacking in detail and shape. What I mean by shape is the drawing relating to something that I the reader would know. Bellow the Hyaenodon is wide squiggly lines that I think are supposed to be grass. They look more like seaweed to me. Also the mountains in the background seem to be just bumps. There is not a lot of detail to them and I found this to be distracting. The big idea of this poetry book is education of prehistoric mammals and how they relate to their modern mammal counter parts. Each poem revolves around educating the reader on the prehistoric mammal and how they compare to the animal of today. ( )