Extreme Abilities: Amazing Human Feats and the Simple Science Behind Them by Galadriel Watson

Stars: ****

Annick Press (2019)
Children’s Nonfiction/Science
88 pages

Disclosure: I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This post contains affiliate links.

Summary: Join author Galadriel Watson as she takes us on a journey of discovery—a tour of the human body’s amazing abilities, featuring masters of muscle, speed demons, brain bosses, and more! Extreme Abilities is a fun and fascinating survey of what humans are capable of, with examples from around the world and throughout history. Short sketches of famous individuals, such as Louis Cyr and Usain Bolt, mixed with stories about the amazing physical feats of others not-so-famous, draw readers in and bring these astounding abilities to life in vivid color. Each chapter also features a section on how young readers can work at improving their own skills (and a section on how not to get hurt in the process), plus bite-sized related fast facts and sidebars.

Extreme Abilities

The book introduces us to special people who can do amazing things such as masters of muscle (super strong people), pretzel people (those who can bend), mind-boggling memorizers (those with amazing memories), ultra-long experts (distance runners), Brain/Body bosses (taking meditation to a new level), deep-sea mermaids and men (deep divers), speed demons (fast people), mathemagicians (math whizzes) and brave balancers (who have amazing balance.)

A few people are introduced in each chapter and tales of their amazing abilities are shared. It’s a mixture of story-telling and fact-explaining. I found it very interesting and amazing at some points. The book is designed for ages 10+ and I tell you as part of that plus, I found it a good read.

Besides the regular text, there are little Fast Fact sidebars and other side notes with more information. The illustrations by Cornelia Li are a fun addition and allow you to visualize what you are reading.