Lizarda and the World Within

Left page: Back cover: mustard background scattered with doodles of smiling microbes, mushrooms, a butterfly, a lizard and two blob creatures high-fiving. Right page: Front cover: bubbly pink title above Lizarda, a long-tailed brown lizard, walking among sparkles, a snail, mushrooms, poop and a flower. “Lizarda and the world within”
Left page: A forest garden: a goat on a mossy hill, purple birds on a birdhouse and a dog asleep in its kennel. “Deep in the forest, there's a little house.” Right page: A little orange wooden house on a stone base, with a purple spider dangling over its roof and potted plants outside. “This is the house of a curious scientist!”
Left page: The scientist, in a lab coat and red glasses, examines poop under a microscope while a rat sits on stacked books. “His house is full of books, papers and mysterious objects.” Right page: Close-up of giant round red glasses with wide eyes staring at a swirl of poop on a lilac box. “The scientist is a bit unusual. He studies poop. He’s a poop scientist!”
Left page: An elephant's back legs and tail, a goat, a rat and a scurrying mouse, with droppings of different shapes and sizes. “He studies poop from different animals” Right page: The scientist writes notes beside a poop sample under a glass dome, with a black dog and a grey cat nearby. “To learn more about the animal that pooped it!”
Left page: A dark grey dog stands smiling with its tail up and a fresh poop behind it. “It might sound silly, but you can actually learn a lot from poop. That’s because poop can tell us what’s going on inside our bodies.” Right page: A larger view of the same dog with its coiled gut glowing orange inside its body, dotted with small poops. “Poop is made in the gut. And inside the gut – yes, yours too…”
Left page: Close-up of the pink coiled gut on a purple background, with small brown bits of poop on its folds. “There's a whole world of little creatures!” Right page: The pink coils of the gut continue across the page, with one more small brown bit of poop. “They're so small, you can't see them. But they're super important!”
Left page: Colourful cartoon microbes float on purple: a green pill-shaped bacterium, a many-armed fungus, a round blue blob and spiky, wiggly shapes. “Welcome to the world within! Here you can find bacteria, fungi and viruses. We call them microbes.” Right page: Two smiling microbes, one green and one purple, high-five; below, a scowling yellow microbe faces a grumpy pink one. “They work together, and sometimes they don’t. But we all have them in our gut, and we need them to be healthy and poop.”
Left page: Seen through an arched window of his house, the scientist holds up a poop sample above a purple stone wall. “What's that?” Right page: Close-up of the purple stone wall: two small eyes peer out of a dark gap between the stones, among green vines. “Something small is peeking out from a hole in the wall.”
Left page: Inside the wall, Lizarda, a brown lizard in a pink nightcap, sits beside leaves in front of the bright opening. “It's Lizarda the lizard! She just woke up. She's groggy and cold” Right page: Lizarda climbs out of the dark hole in the purple stone wall, head raised, with pink flowers growing below. “The morning sun feels lovely on her scaly skin.”
Left page: Lizarda walks through the garden with her pink tongue out, past rocks, mushrooms, plants and a green frog. “When Lizarda has warmed up, she starts to feel hungry. She scutters through the poop scientist’s garden, looking for a snack.” Right page: Lizarda peers over a grey rock, tongue out, at a big-eyed purple fly sitting on a pink flower; a frog watches. “A little fly has landed on a flower nearby. A perfect morning snack for Lizarda.”
Left page: Lizarda leaps across the garden near a stone wall and butterflies; a green slug and a brown moth sit on plates. “Lizarda runs all over the garden, hunting for treats! A juicy slug. A delicious moth.” Right page: A dark blue spider sits on a plate among garden plants, and Lizarda curls up nibbling a big green leaf. “A spicy spider. And for dessert, a sweet leaf.”
Left page: Lizarda lies stretched out on a purple rock, eyes closed and tongue out, with curling grass above and a pink spider below. “After hunting Lizarda is tired and needs to rest a little in the sun. Soon enough though, she's off again to look for dinner.” Right page: A huge brown dog's face with a pink tongue pokes through grass and pink flowers above Lizarda, who walks along below. “But in the garden there's another animal looking for the very same thing.”
Left page: A big dark brown dog leaps forward, tongue out and paws stretched towards Lizarda, who looks up at her wide-eyed. “A poopy brown dog! She wants to eat Lizarda for dinner!” Right page: The dog trots happily after Lizarda, who sprints away with sweat drops flying, past purple rocks, flowers and a pink butterfly. “Or maybe she just wants to play? Lizarda can't know. Luckily, Lizarda is fast!”
Left page: Three scenes on orange show the dog chasing a running, sweating Lizarda in different directions, tongue out and paws reaching. “Poopy dog chases Lizarda all over the garden!” Right page: Colourful microbes of many shapes float on a purple background with worried, frowning and sweating faces. “When Lizarda is stressed the microbes get stressed too!”
Left page: The big dog, mouth open and tongue out, is right behind a small, sweating Lizarda running above some flowers and mushrooms. “Lizarda is getting tired. Poopy dog is still chasing her.” Right page: Close-up of Lizarda glancing back with limbs spread as her curly tail pops off and floats above her, its cut end orange. “Lizarda has a secret trick… she drops her tail!”
Left page: The dog stands on her hind legs tossing the wriggling tail in the air while tailless Lizarda hides behind orange flowers. “Poopy dog starts playing with the tail. Lizarda is safe!” Right page: Tailless Lizarda climbs a green hill towards a tree at dusk, while a purple bird flies overhead. “The sun is setting, it’s getting cold. Lizarda goes back to her hole to sleep.”
Left page: Lizarda sleeps curled among leaves in her hole wearing a pink nightcap, with a moon and stars visible through the opening. “Good night, Lizarda” Right page: A grassy hill beside a tree at night, dotted with several small brown piles of lizard poop among curly plants. “But during the day, Lizarda has not just eaten. She has pooped a lot too!”
Left page: A scientist with poop-shaped brown hair, red glasses, lab coat and green gloves holds up a tiny poop; a dog walks by. “The poop scientist collects the poop.” Right page: Seen from above, the scientist examines a poop through a pink magnifying glass at a desk while the dog peeks in. “In the lab he studies it.”
Left page: The scientist peers through a pink magnifying glass; three bubbles above show a fly, a slug and a bug with curly antennae. “The poop shows that Lizarda has eaten a lot of insects.” Right page: The scientist jumps for joy with arms and legs spread, eyes closed and smiling, surrounded by sparkles and floating poops. “That's so interesting! The poop scientist can't wait to collect more poop!”
Left page: Close-up of the scientist's face in profile with red glasses, resting a hand on a sheet of crayon drawings. Right page: A cream sheet of paper covered in crayon sketches of Lizarda, a spider and various microbes in pastel colours. “To learn more about Lizarda's life, and the microbes inside her!”
Left page: Lizarda sleeps curled up among autumn leaves in a pink nightcap, and a tiny creature in a pink cap sleeps below. “And while the poop scientist studies Lizarda’s poop, Lizarda sleeps.” Right page: Inside her gut, shown as a magenta space, cheerful colourful microbes of many shapes float about, two of them high-fiving. “In her gut, the microbes are hard at work to make more poop for the next day!”