WARNING: You will need Adobe Flash Player 6 or above to view this website. Click here to download it or here if you know you already have it. Ziggy and The Black Dinosaurs: The Buried Bones Mystery Writing for kids should be fresh and interesting, with lively dialogue. Sharon M. Draper's Ziggy and the Black Dinosaurs, illustrated by James Ransome, is just that; it's warm, light-hearted and ultimately educational. Drapers paints colorful pictures with her words, bringing each character vividly to life. And lively characters they are. The story unfolds around the summer vacation of four 10-year-old boys. The plot is filled with humor and fun, making the overall read energetic and uplifting. Each of the four boys is explicitly detailed, generating an immediate identification with the four heroes. Rico, the first character we meet, is neat, orderly and afraid of bugs. Jerome is short, strong and tough, but has to babysit his two younger sisters all summer. Rashawn, whose father is a police officer, is tall and skinny; and last but not least there is Ziggy, a Jamaican American, who is bouncy, fun-loving -- and wants desperately to be a spy for the F.B. of I. The illustrations in the book reinforce the imagery of the text, and effectively endear our hearts to the boys. The dilemma the boys must resolve is what are they going to do for the entire summer after someone trashes their basketball court. A suspenseful tale unfolds as the four stumble upon a mysterious box of bones while building their Black Dinosaurs club house. No one enjoys a mystery like little boys, and these four go on to collect clues and uncover some extremely interesting and historical information. And so will young readers. The box of bones is a distant reference to the African Burial Grounds recently discovered in New York City's lower Manhattan. The epilogue to the book includes a reprint from the Office of Public Education and Interpretation of the African Burial Ground in New York. The data enclosed therein can easily be used in a lesson plan, making Drapers' Ziggy and the Black Dinosaurs a useful and fun addition to any syllabus. Lesia Graham-Figueira back to lessons section