THE LIBRARY
The latest book releases for curious minds
SECRET STORIES OF LOST BEASTS
RISE, ANCIENT ANIMALS OF YORE
AUTHOR SASKIA GWINN
ILLUSTRATOR VASILISA ROMANENKO
PUBLISHER QUARTO
PRICE £14.99 / $24.99
RELEASE OUT NOW
We don’t talk much about what we don’t know about the thousands of long-extinct animal species that have lived on Earth, which is probably why a book about their secrets is so compelling. Secret Stories of Lost Beasts is a walk through the prehistory of the animal kingdom, from the truly ancient and weird creatures that lived hundreds of millions of years ago to somewhat familiar and often furry or feathered species that were around up until a few decades ago. Between Vasilisa Romanenko’s evocative illustrations, there isn’t room for author Saskia Gwinn to spare waxing lyrical about each creature, so she’s armed herself with the coolest facts and stats and put together a pithy and compelling story for each species. Like the 70-million-year-old Beelzebufo, which may be the heaviest frog to ever exist, with an armoured head and a gigantic maw that could make short work of small dinosaurs. Or Sarcosuchus the super-crocodile, a 12-metre monster that ate absolutely anything it could clamp its massive jaws around yet mysteriously died out, despite sharing the same waters as the ancestor of a fish species that lives today.