Ten of the Best: Books on Green Issues
Sue Unstead chooses her top ten ‘green’ books.
In many households the most vociferous eco-warriors are often the youngest members, and woe betide you if the green police spot you sneaking an offending item into the wrong recycling bin. So it is good to see that there is a huge range of titles available on the environment and green issues, if only to educate parents. Children certainly don’t want to listen to doom mongers. All the books chosen here carry a positive message that it’s not too late if we act now and that even small changes can help make a real difference. There are whole shelves of volumes on recycling and greenhouse gases that will undoubtedly prove useful for school projects, but the titles listed here are ones that children might turn to more than once, and that a parent might enjoy sharing. They are books to light a spark and really inspire us to make changes. Most are printed on paper incorporating recycled materials and using vegetable inks.
The Trouble with Dragons
Debi Gliori, Bloomsbury, 978 0 7475 9541 0, £5.99 pbk
The Trouble with Dragons is a cautionary tale in picture-book format for little ones about what happens when dragons run amok, chopping down the forests and melting all the ice with their hot breath. ‘And we all know a dragon or two.’ Debi Gliori’s message to ‘respect all Earth’s creatures and cherish the land’ is all the more effective for its gentle humour and quirky artwork. (Under 5s)
Let’s Save the Animals
Frances Barry, Walker, 978 1 4063 1249 2, £9.99 hbk
Frances Barry’s striking collage artworks are used to good effect in Let’s Save the Animals, featuring creatures whose existence is threatened, from the African elephant and giant panda to the Emperor penguin and polar bear. Flaps and die-cuts add a novelty element to this simple introduction to animal conservation. (3+)
10 Things I can Do to Help My World
Melanie Walsh, Walker, 978 1 4063 2029 9, £6.99 pbk
My Green Day
Melanie Walsh, Walker, 978 1 4063 1912 5, £10.99 novelty hbk
It’s hard to choose between Melanie Walsh’s 10 Things I can Do to Help My World and My Green Day, so I include them both (and cheat on my total of ten). Cut-outs to peep through and flaps to open make the books fun to share, with their simple suggestions for preschoolers to make each day a greener day. (Under 5s)
Why the Animals Came to Town
Michael Foreman, Walker, 978 1 4063 2995 7, £5.99 pbk
A small boy is woken by ‘The tramp, tramp, tramp of marching feet, Louder and louder down our street,’ as a parade of animals from around the world visit him to bring an urgent message. Michael Foreman’s lyrical watercolours are matched by rhyming text to make a powerful environmental plea. There are echoes here of John Burningham’s evocative Oi! Get Off Our Train. (5-8)
31 Ways to Change the World
We Are What We Do, Walker, 978 1 4063 2715 1, £5.00 pbk
Smart, stylish and guaranteed to catch the eye of the most reluctant eco-warrior, 31 Ways to Change the World was written by 4,386 children ‘more or less’ and the action group We Are What We Do. This paperback edition of the bestselling Teach Your Granny to Text and Other Ways to Change the World is full of practical suggestions for creating change. Their maxim is: small actions x lots of people = BIG CHANGE. It puts the responsibility for making change into the hands of children – everything from recycling your toys to stopping junk mail. (5+)
The Big Green Book
Ian Winton and Fred Pearce, Eden Project/Random House, 978 1 905 81143 4, £12.99 novelty hbk
The Big Green Book, produced by the team at the Eden Project, uses pop-ups, flaps, tabs and mini books to explore the ways in which we can help protect our planet. Colourful and busy, it should appeal to primary age children. (8-10)
How the World Works
Christiane Dorion, Templar, 978 1 84877 189 5, £12.99 novelty hbk
How the World Works takes a similar approach, describing itself as ‘a hands-on guide to our amazing planet’, using pop-ups and moving pages to explain processes such as the water cycle, the weather and ocean currents. Information on green issues such as carbon footprints and ‘bioaccumulation’ are incorporated as part of the story. (8-10)
Spud Goes Green
Giles Thaxton, ill. Nigel Baines, Egmont, 978 1 4052 1731 6, £5.99 pbk
Spud Goes Green, winner of the Blue Peter award for Best Book with Facts, adopts just the right tone – chatty without becoming hectoring. Our hero Spud is engagingly dim, so it’s down to his knowledgeable friend Adi to offer most of the advice. A mixture of practical projects and information is neatly combined in diary format, helped along by copious jokes and cartoon artwork – everything from fixing leaky taps and draughty doors to growing your own vegetables and composting. (8-10)
One Hen
Katie Smith Milway, ill. Eugenie Fernandes, A & C Black, 978 1 4081 0981 6, £6.99 pbk
One Hen has a slightly different thrust, focusing on sustainable development. It tells the story of how one small loan – of a few coins to buy a hen – made a huge difference not just to one boy and his family but to a whole community in Ghana, West Africa. It’s a book for sharing and for discussion about the bigger picture of global citizenship and responsibility for one another. (8-10)
Gaia Warriors
Nicola Davies, Walker, 978 1 4063 1234 8, £9.99 pbk
For older readers, the suitably challenging Gaia Warriors teams zoologist Nicola Davies with the creator of the Gaia theory James Lovelock to show why we need to join the fight to deal with global warming and climate change. Davies puts over a very positive message that it’s not all doom and gloom and that change can be challenging and exciting. She writes: ‘I think there’s a shift happening in people’s hearts and minds, not just towards the need to save our skins from climate change, but towards a more deeply respectful relationship with the planet that’s given us life.’ (10-14)
Sue Unstead was a publisher of children’s non-fiction for 25 years and is now a freelance editorial consultant and writer.
