The Circulatory Story
Mary Corcoran, author
Mary Corcoran grew up in Mount Vernon, New York. Camping trips with her large family were a great opportunity for a young girl fascinated by the natural world and interested in the sciences.
Mary studied Biology at the City University of New York-Lehman College and did her student teaching at the Bronx High School of Science. After working as a Student Conservation Association volunteer at Acadia National Park in Maine and at Badlands National Park in South Dakota, Mary moved to Colorado Springs and dedicated her life to teaching science.
Read more about Mary.
Jef Czekaj, illustrator
Jef Czekaj is a cartoonist, musician, and poster artist who lives and works in Somerville, Massachusetts.
His adventure comic strip, Grandpa and Julie: Shark Hunters, is read by over a million children monthly in Spanish and English in Nickelodeon Magazine. A Zeric-award-winning collection of the first 3 years of this strip has been collected in a book of the same name (Top Shelf). His self-published comic Hypertruck has been called "the funniest indie-obsessed subcultural screed ever photocopied" by the Seattle Stranger.
Read more about Jef.
- A Junior Library Guild Selection
Booklist
Showing why "it's great to circulate," the author and illustrator of The Quest to Digest (2006) take young readers on an equally engaging ride through the heart, lungs, arteries, veins, capillaries, and back again. In the big, labeled cartoon illustrations a small, green Shmoo-like creature rides a red blood cell down a river of plasma ("YEE HAW!"), "passes gas" to a body cell in exchange for a bag of CO2, sits back to watch as white blood cells and platelets race to a skinned knee, then threateningly wards off a cheeseburger and other fatty, arterial plaque-causing foods. Corcoran's breezy commentary lays out the whole 60,000-mile system in easy-to-understand terms, giving readers a chance to add words like erythrocyte, leukocyte, and sino-atrial node to their personal lexicons and closing with well-chosen books and Web sites to spur further investigation. An irresistible invitation to go with the flow.
Paperback
ISBN: 978-1-58089-209-4
E-book
ISBN: 978-1-60734-180-2 PDF
Ages: 8-12
Page count: 44
8 1/2 x 11