Booklist

It’s hard to make life on other planets seem boring, and this title in the Extraterrestrial Life series certainly captures the subject’s inherent allure, while maintaining a serious, rather than a sensationalistic, tone. Kids expecting hair-raising stories about green men from Mars will instead learn about the compounds necessary for life and their availability on other planets, the microbial threat of extraterrestrial life, and communication with other life forms. The solid text also includes theories about what (and who) might be out there, from writers such as Carl Sagan and Issac Asimov, along with details about SETI, the program that tries to communicate with extraterrestrial life. Interesting sidebars are a great addition (an excerpt from an article asks if SETI communications should be more pithy, like Twitter messages), and the book’s computer-generated illustrations do take advantage of its subject with a couple of images of scary ETs. The title’s focus on whether aliens are a threat will draw kids in. This well-sourced volume closes with a glossary and list of websites and suggested books.