My children enjoyed reading this book with me. The life of a polar bear in the Arctic is described in second-person, as if the author is talking to the bear. We were astounded to learn that winter is the good time of the year for polar bears. We also enjoyed the illustrations, as we studied the cut-paper pictures to see how they were made.
I received a free ecopy of this book from NetGalley and chose to write a review.

Great Polar Bear would be a wonderful addition to any polar studies. I had one child in particular who immediately connected with the story and loved it.

I loved how the illustrations turned out; they were so interesting to look at and really added to the story. Also, I loved how at the end of the book, it said “explorer’s notes” instead of “author’s notes.” Fantastic.

Downloaded through Netgalley free for an honest review. This would be a great read aloud for elementary. Or, read alone for an older elementary student. The book would be too lengthy for younger elementary kids. But it's cute, informative and lovely to look at!

"Great polar bear...
how do you survive
on the thick ice covering the deep Arctic Sea?"

Thus begins the journey of a powerful and impressive polar bear as he roams the barren frozen landscape of the Arctic, solo. The author documents his scientifically accurate movements for about a year.

She explains how these magnificent creatures forage for their food, have to rely on a healthy arctic ecosystem and perfect ice creating weather. Ideal ice is critical for their very existence and for future polar bear generations to transpire.

Carolyn Lesser uses her beautiful hand-painted and cut-out paper collages to further enrich and enhance her narrative. This book was originally published in 1996 as "The Great Crystal Bear" and since then the author has updated it with all-new artwork for the reader's enjoyment. They truly are spectacular.

She cleverly includes at the end of the book: explorer's notes, a map depicting the global location of polar bears, and her own personal journal. I think the book should be geared to a higher age level as it is slower-paced and includes facts that older children will find more interesting than a younger reader. The story is told in freeform poetry style which is very lyrical and therefore easy to read. To me, the illustrations were by far the best part of the book and I do recommend that this book to be included in classrooms and elementary school libraries.

I really wanted to love this book, but unfortunately, the story fell flat for me. The "illustrations" were breathtaking. It looks like the pictures/illustrations were created by ripping and layering construction paper, and drawing on top of the layers. It created a truly uniquely beautiful look, and if i was rating on the illustrations alone, my ration would be a solid 5/5. The story however, felt very dragged out and dry. I realize it is supposed to be an educational story, but i could hardly stay interested, let alone a 5 year old.

I received a digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This story is way to long. It wants to be a non-fiction book about the life cycle of a polar bear. But it’s only half a life cycle. It does hit on how climate change is endangering the polar bear but it’s format takes too long to get to the point of the story. That part of the problem. It wants to be a story, but is more fact than fun.

This story is fiction, but it is scientifically accurate so it is close to a non-fiction book. It shows a year in the life of a full-grown male polar bear. It shows how he travels, hunts, eats, mates, helps teach the young to fight and gradually gets thinner and thinner as the seasons progress, until he starts over again. This book could easily be used when studying Arctic Animals, Ecosystems and Global warming and its affect on wildlife. The story is told in freeform poetry style which is very lyrical and easy to read. The illustrations are wonderful. They are torn paper with some painting. A great addition to a public, school or class library. The publisher generously provided me with a copy of this book via netgalley.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The illustrative artwork is beautiful and captures the life of a polar bear--isolated, dangerous, both plentiful and scarce, both beautiful and deadly. The text weaves a story that depicts the yearly life cycle. The attention to detail from the way the ice moves and cleaves to the way the northern lights ripple in the sky is amazing. Nothing is overlooked, glossed over or rushed past. The bear's story is not for the feint of heart from the death of the seals the bear and other animals feed on to the scarce days of the summer. The Explorer's Notes and Author's Journal section at the end are very informative. I was glad for the inclusion of the map depicting polar bear habitats. This would make a good addition to the library, but I wouldn't personally recommend it until the later elementary years.

I seldom review children’s books due to a perpetual scarcity of reading time, but I was tempted away from my usual diet of literary fiction and serious biography by this enchanting tale of an Arctic polar bear.

Author and illustrator, Carolyn Lesser, seamlessly weaves scientific fact into her poetic narrative in such a way that it doesn’t anthropomorphise the beguiling but formidable creature. We follow him as he moves steadily across the tundra, sniffing the icy air with his sensitive nose, seeking a female. We see him sleeping beneath the snow as freezing winds rage above his head; and we smile as he play-fights with exuberant cubs. We also shudder when he seizes a seal emerging from a breathing hole, knowing the bear must do this to survive.

At the end of the book we discover some ‘Explorer’s Notes’ and a colourful map showing whereabouts in the world polar bears live. There are a couple of pages from the ‘Author’s Journal’ with photographs showing St Louis dwelling Lesser coming face to face (close enough to smell its fishy breath) with a “big male” in Canada’s Cape Churchill. She describes the experience as forming “every word and shred of hand-painted, cut paper” in her book.

Lesser’s superb artwork captures the beauty and power of the enormous Ursus maritimus and its pristine yet harsh environment. As a child, I would have loved reading this book and, had I done so, would have embarked on life a more knowledgeable adult. There is, however, plenty here for parents to learn about this magnificent, mysterious animal.

The problem with this book, which has lovely illustrations, is that it skirts around the issue of global warming (AKA climet change). The other book that did this recently was <a href=“https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2299395421”>The Coral Kingdom</a>, which only mentioned in the last page that the coral was being bleached.

And like the Coral Kingdom, this goes through the year in the life of a polar bear, but never says quite what is wrong. For a picture book, I would think it would have been more forthcoming. In fact, as I was reading it, I wondered if the poor bear was distressed. There are a lot of words for a picture book, the artwork is lovely, so it earns the extra star.

In fact, it wasn’t until I read the extra text, at the end, that it was all explained to me, how with shorter winters, the wildlife isn’t given enough time to get fat. If the book had taken that approach, it would have been marvoulous. As it was, it is full of lovely pictures, that would leave most kids scratching their heads, if their havne’t put the book down long ago and run off to play.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

A big thank you to NetGalley and Quarto Publishing for the ARC. I am voluntarily reviewing this book. I am not sure what age range you were shooting for as I didn't see it listed, but I found this to not be geared for young children. This is NOT a bedtime storybook read. The information is excellent and the drawings good, but the language is geared for an older child maybe 12 and up. I enjoyed the book but I am not sure really young children would.

This book is definitely for an older audience. There was a lot of information presented, which was nice for kids that wanted to learn about Polar bears but presented in a story format. I do not see younger kids enjoying this too much because of the lengthy words and pages. The pictures were nice but this definitely not a quick story time read.
I received an ARC of this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

This was a beautifully-rendered (using elegantly torn paper) and charmingly-written novel for young children about the hard life of a polar bear. If I had a criticism I would say it was that climate change, while referenced in a note at the end of the book (which can be used as a talking-point with your child of course), wasn't really factored into the story. I felt it should have been because despite the liars who nay-say it, climate change is real, it's affecting people's lives now as well as the very existence of hundreds of species of plant and animal. It's already affecting Polar bears.

That said, this story tells, in gorgeously-written prose and pulling no punches, of the tough existence of this bear in the frozen north, sleeping in wind-sheltering snowdrifts for warmth, and hunting seals. It describes some of the means by which Polar bears stay warm, including the hollow hairs on their pelt. I think it might have gone more into the fact that it's getting harder for bears to find sufficient food as climate changes, but it does tell a stirring story and if it gets childrens' interest warmed to this icy, precarious life, then it will have served Polar bears well.

In the USA, as I write this, there is a movement - finally - to protect our schools from deranged people with automatic weapons. This is long overdue and shames our politicians that they love the NRA more than they do the lives of young children, but as many lives as are sacrificed to political self-interest and inertia, those lives, awfully tragic and irreplaceable as they are, are a tiny portion of what will be lost if climate change is not addressed. It is the most critical crisis facing humanity today, but selfish business interests are literally buying-off right-wing politicians and these callous, cynical low-lifes are sacrificing our children's future for short-term personal profit. They are also sacrificing nature, Polar bears along with it.

I would like to have seen climate changed addressed more directly here because Polar bears are utterly dependent on the ice-floes which are fast disappearing. While these magnificent animals are technically not considered endangered, they are rated as vulnerable and as the North Pole warms (it's thought that it will be ice-free by mid-century at the present rate of warming), their territory shrinks. If the North Pole melts, since it is already floating on the ocean, it will contribute little to sea-rise, but it will rob Polar bears of a major hunting ground. Because the Greenland ice sheet is all on land, if it melts, it will raise sea levels by over twenty feet. Coasts will be inundated and Polar bears will be left with nowhere to go.

If this book does anything to educate people, especially youngsters, about this crisis, then it will have served us well. I liked the book, loved the prose, found the images quite entrancing, and I highly recommend it.

In this book, we follow the life of a polar bear through the changing of seasons. We learn how it hunts, mates, and what its life is like on different temperatures. Although very well researched and well written, its complex language is not appropriate for children, at least young ones. Children need smaller sentences and simpler words. While I understand this is a non-fiction book, it lacks the action or plot that will capture a young reader's mind. I felt the book was like a documentary, but an adult one, one that children would probably ignore.

That having been said, the illustrations were absolutely stunning. I wouldn't, however, recommend this book as a read for young children, as they most probably wouldn't find it interesting enough.