Woodpeckers of North America: a naturalist's handbook, David Benson and Paul Bannick, Stone Ridge Press,Wrenshall, MN, 90 pages, photos, range maps, soft cover, $12.95.

How a book presents its content to readers can be as important as the content itself. In this case, the content is excellent, the photos are excellent, and so is the design. Content is pleasingly broken into short-takes of text offering a brief but complete discussion of everything important to knowing and identifying North America's woodpeckers.

Design is by Mark (Sparky) Stensaas. He and Benson are from Duluth. Bannick, the photographer, lives in Seattle. Benson writes clearly and cleanly. Bannick is an accomplished photographer.

And Stensaas has an eye for design as sharp as the content. Design is simple and clear. Text includes asides that explore different facets of a bird's life or history. These are attractively denoted with color. I moved through the book with a sense of anticipation.

The range maps, drawn by Matt Kania, are worthy of comment. I've never seen maps like this before in any birding guide. The illustration shows the complete western hemisphere of the world with breeding, winter, and year-round ranges shown in color. The maps put the birds in an overall context other range maps miss. This is a very good idea, something other book designers should copy.