Celebrating WATER with Christy Mihaly

by Sue Heavenrich

Barefoot Books Water: A Deep Dive of Discovery 

by Christy Mihaly; illus. by Mariona Cabassa 

64 pages; ages 8-12

Barefoot Books, 2021

Kick off your shoes and roll up your pant legs, because exploring Christy Mihaly’s newest book is bound to get your feet wet. It will whet your appetite for learning more about our watery planet. And water world we are; water covers a titch over 70% of Earth’s surface. That’s 326 million trillion gallons of water. If you add all the zeroes it looks like this:

326,000,000,000,000,000,000. Looks like a lot, but (because most of Earth's water is ocean or ice) less than 1% of that is precious fresh water, good for drinking.

Filled with stories from around the world and hands-on STEM activities, this book introduces water as an ecosystem, a resource, a science lab, and a challenge for the future. Gate-folds allow extra room for annotated maps and provide an interactive component. A comic water droplet chimes in with commentary and the occasional fact ~ and every now and then you come across little invitations to DIVE DEEPER! 

Flip up the flap to reveal instructions for an experiment or activity.

There are so many things going on in the book, and I wanted to know how Chris was able to keep all the moving parts going in the right direction. So I picked up the phone and called her….

Chris: Barefoot Books is committed to publishing books that highlight environmental and social justice issues. In early 2020, the editorial staff was creating their fall 2021 list, and wanted to focus on conservation, community, and connectedness. They identified water as a theme they wanted to pursue. They wanted a book that would put water into a global context. Then they went looking for an author. They found me through a chain of connections: one of their authors knew an environmental activist who knew me. It was a little bit of serendipity and a bit about becoming known as an author who writes for kids.

Me: This book was a “pandemic project” for you, right?

Chris: Totally! Back in March 2020, I had a calendar full of bookstore and conference events for Free For You And Me, my book about the First Amendment that released that month. But with everything cancelled, I ended up with a lot of blank space on my calendar. So when Barefoot Books called, I had plenty of time to devote to a new project.

Me: Talk about doing research during a pandemic. Was it easy to locate resources?

Chris contemplating water...

Chris: Thankfully, I didn’t need to travel to visit archives. There was so much great information available online from reliable government and academic resources. And the book was reviewed by scientific experts. One thing I did was use footnotes during the drafting process. I love footnotes; they help me keep track of what sources which facts came from. That information helped as I went through the many revisions of this manuscript, and needed to check on facts. And the cool thing: footnotes are easy to insert while writing, and then you can take them out at the end.

Me (flipping through the pages): Water seems like such a huge topic… there’s salt water, fresh water, the water cycle, things that live in water...

Chris: It is! Even though the book is divided into sections, everything is related to everything else. I wanted to convey how wondrous water is, along with Earth and all its natural systems, to provide facts, share ideas, and give young readers a sense of hope. I want kids to come away from this book caring about water and feeling empowered to act.

Me: Often the writer has little opportunity to talk with the illustrator. What was your experience like?

Chris: Isn't the art amazing? I haven't talked directly with Mariona Cabassa, the illustrator, but I saw numerous rounds of her sketches and rough art and had plenty of opportunity to review it both for accuracy and for how concepts are presented. I did some educating, for example, about the shape of raindrops (round) versus the shape of water drops from a faucet (tear-shaped). (It has to do with surface tension and gravity.) And I had countless conversations with Emma Parkin, who did both editing and art directing, about not only the text but also the design of spreads, including where we might place gatefolds and the fold-up flaps for activities. The whole process was extremely collaborative, more than any other project I've worked on. 

Me: Opening the gatefolds and the Dive Deeper invitations created a nice interactive touch. Thanks for dropping by the GROG today. 

Check out the book trailer here. Chris is a member of #STEAMTeam2021. You can find out more about her and her wonderful books over at her website. Review copy provided the publisher.

Environmental Writing sends Earth Day message

by Sue Heavenrich

On a normal spring day bees cluster on willow catkins, filling the air with buzzing. But last year the bees were few and far between. I began to worry we might have a silent spring.

Thing is, native and bumble bee populations are declining. For those of us who like to eat, this is a problem because bees pollinate 75 percent of the fruits, vegetables, and nuts grown in the United States – about $3 billion worth of crops each year. Plus, they pollinate plants and fruit trees that provide food for birds and other wildlife.

Rebecca E. Hirsch dives into the pollinator crisis in her most recent book, Where Have All the Bees Gone? She begins her tale by taking the reader on a field trip to find Franklin’s bumble bee, once common in Oregon and California. That bee hasn’t been seen since 2001, and it’s not the only bumble bee in decline either. In her book, Rebecca highlights what can happen when wild bees disappear. For example, decades of pesticide use in apple orchards in Sichuan, China, killed off the natural pollinators. Now farmers have to pay workers to climb ladders and hand-pollinate the blossoms using paintbrushes of bamboo and chicken feathers.

But, says Rebecca, we can change things. She concludes her book with two chapters devoted to bee conservation and positive action kids – and their families –  can take: plant gardens for pollinators; engage in citizen science bee counts; and encourage organic farming and gardening. Back matter includes a list of online resources and links to citizen science projects making it a perfect book for Earth Day!

So I caught up with Rebecca by phone a few weeks ago. Had she intended her book to be an activist call to action, I wondered?

Yes, she said. “I wanted to embrace the more activist part of environmental writing. I wanted to appeal to emotion and encourage people to take action.” So she turned to Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring as a mentor text, reading and re-reading passages to see how Rachel put words to the page.

Inspiration to write about bees came while volunteering at a local pollinator garden. It was eight years ago, Rebecca said.  “At first I worked there because I wanted to see the butterflies. But all the master gardeners talked about were the bees, so I started to pay attention to them.” When Rebecca planted native plants in her own garden, she noticed the bees visited every day. The butterflies? Only occasionally.

When she heard hints about bees in trouble, Rebecca began learning about the Rusty patch bumble bee. It was the first bee to be put on the endangered species list, “and that was when I decided to do a book about bees,” she said. Rebecca also spent time at a rural school. One of the teachers works with his class to convert a strip of grass into pollinator garden every year.

“There’s so much that people can do to help,” Rebecca says. “If you put native plants in your garden, bees will show up! If you mow less often and let the clover grow, bees will show up.”

As a nonfiction writer, Rebecca feels most comfortable with facts. “I had to learn that it’s okay for people to have a point of view.” As she read other writers, Rebecca decided that she needed to figure out how to imbue her writing with a more activist voice. “We need to be shouting about the environmental stuff,” she said, referring to climate change and other issues. “Even if you’re not an environmental writer, find a way to work environmental concerns into your story.”

You can find out more about Rebecca at her website.