Stephen Biesty's Cross-Sections Castle (DK Stephen Biesty Cross-Sections)

Kids absolutely love it and find it really funny and engaging. Great for keeping the quietly engrossed.

My 10 year old daughter absolutely loves this books. She likes to visit castles and read about them later on. This is a brilliant resource for her to explore. It contains really detailed description of the construction of the castle as well as the life in this enormous fortress. Every page is filled with the amazing illustrations and information from defence to entertainment. The cover is extremely well designed and grabbed our attention straight away. This book is amazing! Every page is a peace of art and it can be a great present for all children interested in castles or history. I would also recommend it as the resource for schools - I think it would inspire many young readers.

Perhaps, on reflection, this is the only castles & knights book we actually needed? It covers all the bases: feudalism, heraldry, sieges, the various buildings that make up a castle, etc. There's a spyto find on every page and - gladly - the illustrator does not spare the gory gruesome reality. There are arrows galore, some buttocks, a headless body floating in the moat - but don’t be put off if you’re prudish, these are details you’ll spot if you look for them. The book is also jam-packed with info I didn’t know before, and I was pleasantly surprised because the book was much thinner than the usual DK doorstoppers, so I feared it might also be light on knowledge. My only criticism: the detail, and the text, are both rather small. Kids might cope, but grandparents will struggle to see what’s going on. With buttocks etc on display, perhaps that’s not entirely a bad thing!

A lovely book with so many facts details and little things to notice and find - every time you read it you spot something new. Also coincidentally aligned perfectly with a school project on Castles - so absolutely spot on for that. As you’d expect the facts are quick and to the point and nothing is covered in absolute depth, but it’s still a fantastic book for covering key points about castles and how they were built, worked and so on. Only downside is the pictures are VERY small so it is easy to miss things, but this shouldn’t be an issue for most children and they can always use a magnifying glass.

This lavishly illustrated book featuring minutely detailed cross-sections of castles was a huge hit in my house with my ten-year-old son and seven-year-old daughter. The illustrations are reprinted from an older edition, which makes sense because it has a familiar feel from my own childhood, of those illustrated non-fiction books where you could pore over the details for hours, interpreting stories in all the little actions of the characters. Educational and fun, this is dense with details but also not too long, so not a difficult read for an engaged child. In my opinion it gets the balance just right and I’d definitely recommend it.

This 25th-anniversary reprint of the Castle Cross-Sections is great. It's a smaller format than the original edition (that I still have), which makes it easier for storing and reading, but possible makes the pages even busier than they already were. The book itself is fabulous, a wonderful detailed breakdown of the inner workings of a medieval castle. Like all DK books the production values. Every page is a visual feast and crammed full of interesting information. It's perfect for homework projects or to inspire interested children (and adults)

My 8 year old son absolutely loves books on castles. When I gave him this to read, he was absolutely absorbed by it. It contains huge amounts of detail on the construction of castles - having many cut-away diagrams. Every page is larger than A4, and they are packed with small text giving all manner of information about everything from construction to tools, to politics, to food, entertainment, castle management, trades, livestock and punishments. The book is thin, and only contains 19 pages which feature content, but they are really jam-packed. I have no criticism of the content. One thing I will say is that at the current price - it works out at only just less than a pound per page - that's really quite a lot. I think they need to bring it comfortably under a tenner for me to say it's good value.

This is the most gorgeous book. I gather other reviews have been of the paperback but this is a large hardback and it is the 25th anniversary edition. As the title says this is a book showing the cross sections of a medieaval castle and it is totally fascinating to read. It is classed as a book for 9-10 year olds and I will be giving this to my granddaughter but have to say I am sorely tempted to keep it for myself! There are chapters, each superbly illustrated, on Defence and Siege, Garrison and Prisoners, Trades and Skills, Food and Feasting, Entertainment and more. The Defence and Siege chapter is incredibly informative with the sections showing how the different parts of the castle were defended and where the garrison was stationed to ward off invaders. Bowls of water were placed on the floor so that it would ripple and warn them if there was any underground activity. So simple and so sensible! I could rave about this book for ages and talk about each chapter but I would just be repeating myself about how wonderful it is. I cannot praise the intricate and beautiful drawings enough. You can look and look and think you have seen it all and then spot another detail in the corner of the page or a picture. Dorling Kindersley the publishers are known for the beauty and splendour of their illustrated books. Their travel guides are wonderful to have and to read, even if you never go there, precisely because they are such beautiful books. This is no exception. I am sure that my granddaughter will love this and find it very useful for history projects in her school work. FIve stars from me