If you've never seen a lowland tapir, you're not alone. Most of the people who live near tapir habitat in Brazil's vast Pantanal ("the Everglades on steroids") haven't seen the elusive snorkel-snouted mammal, either. In this arresting nonfiction picture book, Sibert winners Sy Montgomery and Nic Bishop join a tapir-finding expedition led by the Brazilian field scientist Pati Medici. Aspiring scientists will love the immediate, often humorous "you are there" descriptions of fieldwork, and gadget lovers will revel in the high-tech science at play, from microchips to the camera traps that capture the "soap opera: of tapir life. AGES: 10 up AUTHOR: This is the Sibert Medal author Sy Montgomery's ninth nonfiction title with Houghton Mifflin. Visit her website at www.symontgomery.com. The Sibert Medal photographer Nic Bishop is a well-known nature photographer of many award-winning children's books. Visit his website at www.nicbishop.com. ILLUSTRATIONS: Colour photographs