The Secret Life of the Sloth

March 1, 2021
Grades K-3 Perezoso, a sloth, lives in a rain forest. She swims across a river but progresses extremely slowly on land, hauling her body and weak legs forward with her strong arms. Though her eyesight is poor, her sense of smell guides her into the canopy of a particular tree to eat its leaves. Her nearly motionless body and the green algae growing in her fur provide the camouflage needed to avoid predators. After Perezoso gives birth, the baby clings to her chest and belly wherever she goes. As he grows, she teaches him what to eat, how to swim, and other survival skills. When he's ready for independence, she leaves to find another home. Like other volumes in the Secret Life series, this book offers an engaging narrative that spotlights the daily life of an individual animal while including information that applies broadly to others of the species. Created with soft pastels, aqua crayons, and walnut ink, the beautifully textured, richly atmospheric illustrations capture events and reinforce information presented in the text. A fascinating introduction to the sloth.

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A slice of rainforest life. In the same vein as their Secret Life of the Skunk (2019), Pringle pairs an intimate account of the life of a brown-throated three-fingered sloth to Garchinsky's impressionistic crayon-and-pastel close-ups of their subjects. Both the protagonist sloth and, later, her offspring bear smiles that may seem at first glance to be anthropomorphic, but that is actually their natural expression. If naming the mother sloth Perezoso (Spanish for sloth, Pringle explains in his afterword) and later commenting that the two sloths sometimes go for a swim "just for fun" stretches reality a bit, in general the author sticks to plausible behavior and emotional responses in his evocatively slow, careful descriptions of the animal's arboreal habits and physical features. Brushes with a harpy eagle and, following a once-a-week descent to ground level to poop, a jaguar provide dramatic moments, and the closing revelation that once young sloths have grown and learned enough to be independent, it's the parent who leaves to find a new home range may surprise even well-read young naturalists. (They probably won't be surprised by the final note about human threats to sloths and their habitats, though.) Touching and informative: a beguiling invitation to share a branch with a pair of laid-back, uniquely adapted tree dwellers. (glossary, bibliography) (Informational picture book. 6-9)

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