ALA Booklist (Tue Apr 01 00:00:00 CDT 2014)

Pringle (Scorpions!, 2013) informatively narrates the life of a banded woolly caterpillar called Bella, so named for its species, the Isabella tiger moth. Readers are introduced to the caterpillar's anatomy, behavior, and life cycle, following Bella from molting to cocoon to her metamorphosis into a moth that, in turn, lays eggs. Inviting, colorful mixed-media illustrations cover each large page, depicting detailed Bella as she climbs; stiffens her woolly "hairs" against a potential snake attack; and searches for a safe, secret place to wait out the winter and build her cocoon. Each page presents plenty of material for discussion, and an afterword offers more information on banded woolly caterpillars and a glossary of terms used in the text. Since Pringle includes some advanced scientific terms, such as stemmata and glycerol, this would be best read aloud by a skilled reader. With that assistance, newly independent readers will be in good shape to move on by themselves to Marilyn Singer's poetic Caterpillars (2011) or Laura Marsh's Caterpillar to Butterfly (2012).

Horn Book

Informative, engaging, and immediate-feeling, a third-person narrative follows Bella, a banded woolly bear caterpillar, as she grows, molts, avoids dangers, hibernates, weaves a cocoon, and emerges as an Isabella Tiger Moth. Paley's sunny cut-paper and mixed-media art sets the furry critter in colorful landscapes of wild flowers and crunchy leaves. More information and an anatomical diagram conclude the book. Glos.

Kirkus Reviews

The author of more than 100 children's books looks closely at a familiar creature. Naming but not otherwise anthropomorphizing this stealthy survivor, Pringle follows Bella the woolly bear through a "jungle of grasses, clovers, and wild flowers," weaving in information about her food and feeding, body parts and life stages. She's rejected by a predatory blue jay and aided across a road by a helping hand. After finding a good winter hiding place among stones, the bristly red-and-black caterpillar curls up into a cocoon, molts one last time into a pupa and finally turns into an adult Isabella tiger moth. In extensive backmatter, Pringle refutes the myth that woolly bear caterpillars predict the severity of the coming winter. Words like setae and crochets, names for the insect's body parts, are italicized in context and defined in a glossary. Paley's colorful cut-paper and mixed-media illustrations show off Bella and her neighbors nicely. The plants and flowers are generic, but the animals are identifiable. The caterpillar's size can be judged against an illustration of a leaf and part of a human hand, but an actual measurement or scale would have been useful in the final diagram. Straightforward and informative. (Informational picture book. 5-9)

School Library Journal (Tue Apr 01 00:00:00 CDT 2014)

K-Gr 3 In this picture-book equivalent of watching a nature documentary, Bella, a woolly bear caterpillar eats, molts, and eats again in a months-long journey through forests, gardens, and lawns. Potential perils come in the form of a garter snake, a blue jay, and a passing car, though Bella gets through the dangers intact. Italicized insect terms are smoothly incorporated into the story, such as how the three pairs of her "true legs" attached to her thorax allow her to hold a leaf steady when she chews and help her climb. Colorful cut-paper drawings bring Bella and her world to life, emphasizing the texture of her fuzzy-looking black-and-orange body and gloriously displaying the wingspan of the tiger moth she becomes. Further information and a diagram of a woolly bear caterpillar are included in the back matter, all the better to satisfy insect-loving readers. Joanna K. Fabicon, Los Angeles Public Library