Inside the Mesmerizing Magic of a Murmuration
March 15, 2023
Discover the magic of a murmuration of starlings. Just two starlings open the book one morning. They are chilly and restless, taking off and joining other starlings. Flying for days, the flock continues to grow as Martin's illustrations get more and more crowded: hundreds, thousands, millions. They have become a murmuration of starlings, seeking warmth and safety in their huge numbers. Each bird in the flock has allies--those birds flying closest to them--and by paying attention to only their allies, the birds can fly in complex patterns and avoid predators without flying into each other. As sunset nears, the starlings twist and dance in the sky, making ribbons and snakes. And then, all at once, they land to feed and roost. The backmatter offers more info about starlings, but it's incomplete, lacking a map or any description of habitat. Martin tinges his watercolor, pencil, and digital collage illustrations with the oranges, pinks, yellows, and reds of the setting sun, but this makes the timeline confusing since the birds take off in the morning, fly for days, and roost at sunset. He does, however, provide a marvelous sense of scale, placing tiny humans under the flock and showing an enormous ribbon of birds above what in real life are huge windmills. (This book was reviewed digitally.) A good introduction to starling murmurations, though readers will need to fill in the gaps. (Informational picture book. 3-8)
COPYRIGHT(2023) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Starred review from April 1, 2023
Gr 1-4-A stellar narrative nonfiction book about the collective of starlings and their migration. The book opens on a close-up of two starlings; with every spread the number of starlings increases, giving readers the sense and visual depth of the group, which can grow into the thousands and even into the millions. The text poetically describes how the murmuration can be supportive, an alliance, and a defense against predators, while the scenes support this thrillingly. Every digital watercolor lends movement and poignancy to the text. A great read-aloud to share with a group and a great introduction to starlings, Furrow and Napoli's book would make a grand companion to Vulture View by April Pulley Sayre. VERDICT This book answers so many questions about the formations starlings create against the sky without taking away the wonder. It's stunning.-Ruth Guerrier-Pierre
Copyright 2023 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
May 15, 2023
Preschool-Grade 2 A restless pair of speckled starlings meets up with a handful of other birds and flies on, gradually combining with other flocks until the pages fill with black dots nearly covering the sky. They have become a murmuration--a term coined from the sound of thousands of flapping birds overhead. The enormous gathering twists and turns, pitch black in the center of the congregation and lighter at the edges. A menacing falcon, overwhelmed by the ever-shifting mass of birds, gives up trying to pinpoint any of the thousands of moving targets. And just like that, the flock drops to the ground to rest and gather strength for their next flight. The poetic text may be light on facts, but it's lovely in its lyricism. Stunning multimedia drawings glow on the page, saturated in the colors of sunrise and sunset. There is an exquisite sense of movement and scale as the dazzling murmurations seem to dance across the spreads. A gorgeous introduction to a natural wonder.
COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Starred review from July 1, 2023
Starlings are social birds, at times flying in groups so large that their wings create a murmuring sound that can be heard by humans on the ground. A honed text and stunning watercolor, pencil, and digital collage illustrations work together to give readers a sense of this phenomenon. "There are hundreds of us! / There are thousands of us! / There are millions of us!" Furrow brings his background as a scientist and Napoli her wide experience writing for children to this collaboration that has both the rhythm of poetry and simple but accurate information: "We find strength and safety in numbers. / We find warmth in numbers." Starlings fill and overflow the pages, swooping in gorgeous waves across the double-page spreads as the birds escape from a hungry falcon or land en masse in a field. The colors of the mixed-media illustrations bleed and blend together. The edges of each bird's wings are indistinct, smudging and overlapping as the mass travels together across the reds, oranges, and pinks of the sky. A striking gatefold gives a sense of the massive scale of a murmuration. An endnote gives readers additional information about starling behavior. Pair with Scanlon and Preston-Gannon's One Dark Bird (rev. 7/19). Maeve Visser Knoth
(Copyright 2023 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)
Starred review from September 4, 2023
Voicing a collective identity through the first-person plural “we,” starlings perform a fractal air ballet in this spare look at the species’ movements. As the pages turn, Furrow and Napoli’s minimal text traces starlings gathering into a “giant flock” (hundreds, then thousands, then millions). Martin’s expressive multimedia spreads grow accordingly, approximating the undulating black shapes of the birds swirling in unison against a peach-hued sunset. Further lines describe the sound that gives a murmuration its name (“We flap flap our wings,/ making a murmur even those/ on the ground can hear”) and mode of avoiding predators (when the cluster veers, a peregrine falcon rocketing into the flock “can’t target any one of us”). Further emphasizing starlings’ group movements, pages end with the birds’ landing “all at once.... / a sudden plop/ to earth—the starling way.” A brief note concludes. Ages 4–8.
July 1, 2023
Starlings are social birds, at times flying in groups so large that their wings create a murmuring sound that can be heard by humans on the ground. A honed text and stunning watercolor, pencil, and digital collage illustrations work together to give readers a sense of this phenomenon. "There are hundreds of us! / There are thousands of us! / There are millions of us!" Furrow brings his background as a scientist and Napoli her wide experience writing for children to this collaboration that has both the rhythm of poetry and simple but accurate information: "We find strength and safety in numbers. / We find warmth in numbers." Starlings fill and overflow the pages, swooping in gorgeous waves across the double-page spreads as the birds escape from a hungry falcon or land en masse in a field. The colors of the mixed-media illustrations bleed and blend together. The edges of each bird's wings are indistinct, smudging and overlapping as the mass travels together across the reds, oranges, and pinks of the sky. A striking gatefold gives a sense of the massive scale of a murmuration. An endnote gives readers additional information about starling behavior. Pair with Scanlon and Preston-Gannon's One Dark Bird (rev. 7/19).
(Copyright 2023 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)