Candid Craters: Mars Is...Startling Slopes, Silvery Snow, and Startling Surprises by Suzanne Slade

Most kids know that Mars appears as a red star, named after the Roman god of war. But what does it really look like, up close and personal?

People have wondered about the mysteries of Mars for centuries. Over time, scientists have discovered that Mars has weather and seasons, just like earth....

But Mars is unlike earth in so many ways, and now with the striking photos from the sky-rovers candid camera hat we can recognize the wondrous differences.

In scientist Suzanne Slade's just published picture book of of Mars, Mars Is: Stark Slopes, Silvery Snow, and Startling Surprises (Peachtree Publishing, 2021), young readers get color photos that show how many of the features described in books about the Mars Rovers actually look from a camera carried in a different rover-in-the-sky, the HiResolution Imagining Science Experiment Orbiting Mars (the MRO) which photographed some of Mars' most amazing surface phenomena.

Mars is ... Steep Slopes, created by Mars' volcanoes, asteroid and meteor strikes, landslides and Marsquakes.

Mars is... Bubbling Gases and Silvery Snows, courtesy of the frozen carbon dioxide underground which melts in the Martian spring and falls as Silver Snowflakes and Slippery Snow and ice in the Martian winter. The earth has oxygen, but Mars has carbon dioxide, which accounts for many similarities and differences from earth.

Mars is... Sandy Dunes, and Mighty Mesas, and Volcanic Mountains which form Craggy Chasms and Cliffs, while meteor strikes create Craters. And most of all Mars is Breathtaking, (or it would be if we could breathe carbon dioxide, that is!)

Loaded with the recent information about the fifth planet and made almost lilting by the alchemy of author Slade's alliteration, the large color photos made from above Mars surface are intriguing, never seen glimpses of Earth's sister planet, one that elementary age children will find awesome! The author appends photos of the development of the spacecraft which carried the high resolution candid camera over the surprising surface of Mars. Says Booklist's starred review, "Each phrase is perfectly paired with its dramatic photo, while the paragraphs offer facts and fascinating statistics. . . . "