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By Nicola Davies
Afterword by James Lovelock
Candlewick, 2011
$14.99, ages 11-14, 192 pages
Earth's climate is changing fast, but don't be gloomy about it because the fight is on to slow it down and all you have to do is join in, says author Davies in her guide.
Inspired by scientist James Lovelock's theory that Earth is a living system, the guide is a no-nonsense look at how and why the climate is changing, and what readers can do to keep it from getting warmer.
Is the problem big? Davies asks. "Yes. Scary? Maybe. But let's do it anyway." Why? Because we have to, she says.
Davies calls on kids to be warriors for change, and begins and ends the book with quotes that drive home the idea that only people can make the changes happen and if they're to succeed, they can't get bogged down by doubts.
Spiritual leader Mahatma Gandhi once said, "We must be the change we want to see in the world," she writes, while South Africa's first democratically elected president Nelson Mandela championed perseverance: "It always seems impossible until it's done."
"It won't be a picnic," she writes. "�But if we cut our emissions, we stand a chance of keeping civilization together and holding on to some of our most important ecosystems, like the Amazon rain forest."
"If we don't, we risk taking all the fun there is right out of the world."
A zoologist and author of the award-winning Extreme Animals, Davies doesn't try to coax readers to care. In fact, she's even a little brusque: "We can carry on as usual or fry," she concludes in her introduction.
Yet, it's refreshing to know that she says what she thinks and holds nothing back.
Yet, it's refreshing to know that she says what she thinks and holds nothing back.
She even confides that as she began the guide, she was in a funk about the future, just like many of the people she's hoping to reach. "I didn't think I, or anyone else, could make a difference," she wrote. But as she researched what's being done to save Earth and met activists, she became excited and hopeful.
"�I've started to hear a sound, sometimes like a distant rumble of thunder, sometimes l
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