How many times have you been reading a novel and desperately want to know more about the subject of the story?  I’ve read stories set in Venice and needed to know more about this magical place and read Brian Selznick’s The Invention of Hugo Cabret and needed to know more about the early days of movie making.  Usually you have to go to a completely different book or website to find the information you crave.  However, in a brilliant new book by Sylvia Vanden Heede and Marije Tolman, What Dog Knows, fiction and nonfiction are mashed together for the perfect book for inquisitive young readers.

When Wolf finds a fact-filled book in the library, he thinks he will outsmart his clever cousin Dog.

Who knows more about robots, dragons, knights, and pirates?  And what about setting traps, playing tricks, and chewing bones?

What Dog Knows is a one-of-a-kind book that kids are going to gobble up. It’s a book that will make kids laugh and go ‘wow!’ It weaves the story of Dog and Wolf’s antics with information about all sorts of topics, from mummies to pirates and robots to dinosaurs.  Each section of the book focuses on different topics, with Dog and Wolf trying to one-up each other to prove they know more.  They are always picking up books to find out what they need to know. Fiction and nonfiction are presented in two different sized fonts but both weave together seamlessly.

There is a lot to love about What Dog Knows.  The conversations between Dog and Wolf are very funny and full of wit, so any adults who share this book with children will love it just as much as the children.  Boys especially will enjoy the humour and the jokes. Marije Tolman’s illustrations are quirky and perfectly compliment the text. Her diagram of Wolf mummifying a cat is brilliant. The thing I love the most about this book are the simple quizzes to test what readers have learnt and the activities for kids to try that tie in with each topic.

Thanks to Gecko Press for publishing this special book in English.  Without Gecko Press we wouldn’t know about all the wonderful books that are published in other languages. Gecko Press also published Wolf and Dog by the same team and hopefully there are other books to come starring these two characters.

Put What Dog Knows in the hands of all the young readers you know.  Not only will they be entertained, they’ll learn a thing or two along the way.