The artwork in Mountain of Fire was beautiful. I didn't expect the book to be for such a young age though. I still read the entire thing as it is interesting to learn about volcanoes at any age but the cover gives off a bit of an older feel than the content.

Such a great introduction to volcanos, especially for kids (9-12), but also perfect for curious grown ups too. I liked the bold colour illustrations throughout the book, and the informative pieces about volcanos around the world. I also think the illustrations are a great introduction to volcanos for younger kids that might get freaked out by real pictures of the fire power of the real deal, and help them keep their ears open to new information. I loved the story of what sparked Julie Roberge's interest in volcanology.

Grateful to Orca Books and netgalley for the opportunity to check out the advanced copy of the English edition of this book.

I liked this book, but felt like it just wasn't enough information. It would be an additional purchase for a public library, but there are other books with more content that would be a first purchase. The artwork is nice, but doesn't add a lot in terms of conveying information.

Mountain of Fire: Into the Heart of Volcanoes is written by volcanologist Julie Roberge. This book is quick read that gives quick facts about some of the worlds most famous volcanos.

Kids will enjoy the color blocked illustrations and quick facts. This is definitely not a text heavy book. It would be a great addition to elementary classrooms and ;libraries.


Thank you NetGalley and Orca Book Publishers for the advance copy for review.

“Mountain of Fire: Into the Heart of Volcanoes”, authored by volcanologist Julie Roberge and illustrated by Aless MC, is a quick read that briefly describes the solar system’s most famous volcanoes.

The illustrations were excellent, but sometimes there’d be a simple image stretched across an entire page and I’d wonder why that real estate didn’t have little factoids about volcanos. For example, it would have been nice to learn about the volcanic explosivity index (VEI) and maybe see comparisons so readers could judge just how incredibly huge a super-eruption at Yellowstone’s caldera could be when compared to Vesuvius.

But that’s a minor complaint, so If you’re looking for a book about volcanoes that skims the surface of information about them—and is nicely illustrated, this book is for you and I rate it at 5 out of 5 stars.

One more thing, it may have been an error in the translation from French, but in the Yellowstone section, the text says that Yellowstone’s major eruptions all occurred millions of years ago. The first one was about 2 million years ago, but the second happened about 600,000 years later and the third around 600,000 years after that. If you’re keeping score, the last major eruption was about 600,000 years ago.

Disclaimer: This book is an advance review copy (ARC) that I was given by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.