The Last Seaweed Pie

The Treeple, who live high up in the trees, building houses of sticks, climb with the lemurs and they bake papaya pies. But most of all, the Treeple love to make things. Turn the page… and now we meet the Seaple. The Seaple live deep down in the ocean; they like to build houses of shells, swim with the fishes, and bake seaweed pie. But most of all, the Seaple love to watch nature. So, the Treeple up in the canopy sew and saw, bang and tap, creating more and more and when something new is made, out go the old things, broken or not. And where do they go? Down to the ground, where they pile up and up until the Treeple realise the ground is full up…so they move the old things into the ocean. Meanwhile, the Seaple gaze at the increasing amount of things that float by their homes. But increasingly the things grow larger and darker. Fish get dangled in the mass of old things. Creatures and plants begin to disappear. After eating their last seaweed pie, the Seaple decide they must leave, find somewhere new to live. Washing up on a shore they see different creatures living up in the trees and climb up to meet them. But they are not welcomed by the Treeple who say there is no room for them up aloft. A resolution is found, and the two communities learn to live together, as the biggest of recycling adventures begins. This wonderful book ends with a page entitled, ‘Be an ocean hero!’ Targetting even those of us who live far from an ocean, it explains that litter dropped in the street can easily make its way through streams and rivers and drains, eventually ending up in the ocean.  There follows a list of small changes families can undertake to help, ranging from taking reusable bags for shopping, to turning off the tap when cleaning teeth. Its last suggestion is Keep Learning. Knowledge is power! This book takes a different perspective from the increasing number of books for children on the importance of marine conservation and should be widely acknowledged. It should be in every classroom, and library, and the more homes that can take a little from it, the better our world could be. Its theme of people working together is paramount, and young readers will love the imaginative portrayal of the very different two societies linked together in this story, and the colourful pages of brightness…. and the dark threatening blackness of the polluted ocean.  May this book get the widest of audiences.