The PromiseThe True Blue Scouts of Sugar Man SwampWashashore

Abstract

Book and Film Reviews 138 Editors’ note: This review was originally published in issue 27(3). We are republishing it here with responses from two of the three authors. The Promise Nicola Davies, illustrated by Laura Carlin (2014) Somerville: Candlewick Press, 32 pages $16.99 (hardcover); ISBN: 978-0763666330 The True Blue Scouts of Sugar Man Swamp Kathi Appelt (2013) New York: Atheneum, 352 pages $8.99 (paperback); ISBN: 978-1442421080 Washashore Suzanne Goldsmith (2013) Lucky Marble Books, 282 pages $3.99 (eBook); ISBN: 294-0148371076 Environmental fiction is available to children of all ages and in various formats. Educators would do well to remember that a “story can be remembered when instruction is forgotten,” so fiction can be a useful tool when teaching any subject— not just language arts (Bigger, 2010, p. 411). When fiction is not used, the facts students cram for tests will likely just as easily be crammed out when the test is over because they have made no real connection with the knowledge they have gained. Providing students with realistic fiction, with its lifelike settings, characters, and situations [allows students to] easily relate to the books.… The books can promote empathy and allow readers to see a world beyond their own. [These books] not only convey information to readers, but also encourage children to develop responsibility toward living things (Fleming, 2005, p. 37). The added advantage to using fiction in a learning environment is that children will receive information from different angles, including facts as well as the characters’ dilemmas, enabling the students to “learn information from multiple sources written at a variety of reading levels and in a variety of formats” (Fleming, 2005, p. 36). For educators who want to move in this direction, there are numerous books from which to choose, about many topics. A review of one book for each of the major age groups follows. The first book, a picture book example for children ages 5 to 7, shows how a child transforms a gray, unfriendly city into a joyful place by planting seeds and growing things. The second book, for readers ages 8 to 12, focuses on the preservation of wild land and protection for native species. The last book, for teenaged readers, is concerned with human destruction of environments, specifically through physical and chemical pollution. Book and Film Reviews 139 Picture Books Nicola Davies’ The Promise, illustrated by Laura Carlin, is a picture book that uses both language and color to convey its message to young readers. The city where the story takes place, the narrator, and the environment are linked together—none of them can be fruitful without the others. Davies binds the characters to the world around them simply and beautifully: “Nothing grew. Everything was broken. No one ever smiled” (Davies, 2014, p. 5). As the story continues, the narrator begins to plant acorns around the city. Although she had stolen the seeds, she realized that she “held a forest in [her] arms, and [her] heart was changed” (Davies, 2014, p. 13). With beautiful language—“I pushed aside the mean and hard and ugly, and I planted, planted, planted”—Davies shows that in order to make other things beautiful, the narrator must get rid of the ugly in herself (Davies, 2014, p. 21). When the story turns from ugly and barren to joyful, the illustrations change from the drab grays, browns, and blues that depicted the city into a kaleidoscope of colors. The narrator observes this, noticing poetically that “green spread through the city like a song, breathing to the sky, drawing down the rain like a blessing” (Davies, 2014, p. 29). The Promise is an excellent book that could be used to introduce children to the magic of trees and the satisfaction of planting them yourself, as well as the power nature has to change hearts and minds so that a hard, mean city can become a place of kindness. Because the illustrations effectively support the point of the text, this book enables even very young children to make the connection between trees and goodness. Middle Grade For middle-grade readers, including children aged 8 to 12, the 2013 National Book Award Finalist The True Blue...