Tag Archives: #climatechange

Climate Change: Understanding our Changing Weather 

It is hard to ignore the increasing numbers of unusual or unseasonal severe weather events – think floods, wildfires, droughts, snowstorms – appearing all around the world. Our “climate normal” seems to be changing – but to what? Here’s a new crop of books – by scientists, journalists and even literary writers – to help us make sense of our changing weather, and what we need to do about it.

Fire, Storm and Flood: The violence of climate change

Fire, Storm and Flood: The Violence of Climate Change by James Dyke

Fire, Storm and Flood is a book of stunning photojournalism. Violent climatic events have ravaged the Earth since time began, spanning the vast eons of our planet’s existence. These events have left their mark on both the Earth’s geological and biological records. However, in the few centuries since industrialisation, human activity has increasingly become the driver of climatic events. We are becoming a geological force, impacting the earth with a series of fires, storms and floods. The images in Fire, Storm and Flood, showing the results of large-scale fires, earthquakes, floods and desertification, have a spectacular yet haunting beauty that challenge us to reflect on the devastation caused by climate change. 

Why Does Climate Change?

Why Does Climate Change? Investigate the Causes with Erica and Sven by Laura Ertimo & Mari Ahokoivu

The climate is changing, and so should we! Why Does Climate Change? helps to answer children’s tough questions about climate change, as well as help them understand what can be done to fight it. Best friends Erica and Sven are tired of their parents’ vague answers about the weird weather happening all over the planet, so they decide to research what climate change is really about. Why Does Climate Change? uses the graphic novel format to offer accurate information in an engaging way (complete with gremlins and fairies). It is an ultimately hopeful book that explains how humans are responsible for climate change and what we can do to ensure a brighter future for generations to come. For young readers aged 6-10.

A Brief History of the Earth's Climate

A Brief History of the Earth’s Climate: Everyone’s Guide to the Science of Climate Change by Steven Earle

A Brief History of the Earth’s Climate is the book to read before you debate with anyone sceptical of human-induced climate change. It first discusses the natural changes to the Earth’s climate over 4.6 billion years: including the effects of ocean currents, solar activity, volcanic eruptions; then shows how and why human-caused global warming and climate change is different. This up-to-date book even includes an overview of how the COVID pandemic may impact climate change. Steven Earle then reviews common arguments skeptical of climate change, countering them with logic and compelling scientific evidence. Written by a highly respected geologist and academic, A Brief History of the Earth’s Climate is a highly informative, yet accessible primer to this big topic.

1,001 Voices on Climate Change

1,001 Voices on Climate Change: Everyday Stories of Flood, Fire, Drought, and Displacement from Around the World by Devi Lockwood

These first-hand accounts are the human face of climate change, showing us how people and communities around the world are currently being affected. Over five years, journalist Devi Lockwood travelled through 20 countries across six continents, listening to people’s first-hand experiences of climate change – from Indigenous elders in Tuvalu on disappearing coastlines, to Australians mourning the death of their friends in the bushfires, to the Thai man who had to leave his ancestral farm because changes in rainfall made it no longer viable. Despite diverse localised experiences, themes of displacement, climate migration and food insecurity emerge. These recognisable and relatable stories make a sometimes-abstract topic vivid and urgent.

Firmament

Firmament: The Hidden Science of Weather, Climate Change and the Air That Surrounds Us by Simon Clark

Physicist and science communicator Simon Clark has been popularising atmospheric science through his successful YouTube channel. His first book, Firmament, takes it one step further – showing us the history of how the science was discovered, as well as the physics of how it works. Simon Clark weaves an entertaining and exciting story of discovery, featuring adventurous scientists and often danger (such as an almost fatal hot air balloon flight in Victorian times). Learning about the atmosphere helps us to understand how weather occurs and how scientists monitor and predict weather – which in turn, helps us to comprehend climate change and mitigate its effects.

We are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast

We are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast by Jonathan Safran Foer

Jonathan Safran Foer is best known for literary fiction, but his expressiveness also works to create powerful nonfiction. We are the Weather is his collection of short essays about the climate crisis. With his distinctive wit, insight and humanity, Foer argues that, rather than being an insurmountable problem, there is one small change that each individual can make, that collectively can achieve a sustained and far-reaching impact on the climate crisis: eating fewer animal products. We are the Weather is not your typical big-topic nonfiction book: amongst the facts and statistics, Foer interweaves musings on family, suicide, effort, sense and individual responsibility, as well as a delicious serving of metaphor. For anyone interested in a different approach to making sense of this topic.

Six Amazing Books That Explain Climate Change to Children

Discussing climate change with children can be both a daunting and an inspiring endeavour. Thankfully we have found six books that creatively show how such a critically important topic can actually be a positive and inspiring chat with the younger generation. If we address what many adults think is a devastating topic with a little hope and an open imagination, we can encourage the younger generation to adopt a positive attitude towards the planet of their future. 

Old Enough to Save the Planet by Loll Kirby

Meet 12 real-life children taking action against climate change. 

Old Enough To Save The Planet shares the stories of twelve children taking action against climate change. In this beautifully illustrated book you can learn about the work they do and discover how the future of our planet starts here. The author Loll Kirby is a primary school teacher and forest school leader, based in Bristol. Inspired by the children she teaches, she wrote this book for anyone who wants to make a difference.

The Story of Climate Change by Catherine Barr

The Story of Climate Change is a wonderful way to introduce young readers to one of the most important issues facing our world today. Combining history with science, this book charts the changes in our Earth’s climate, from the beginnings of the planet and its atmosphere, to the Industrial revolution and the dawn of machinery. Kids will learn all about the causes of climate change, such as factory farming and pollution, and the effects that climate change has on humans and animals across the world. As well as discovering the causes and effects of global warming, readers will discover practical ways we can work together to solve it, from using renewable energy to swapping meat for vegetables in our diet. The Story of Climate Change will give kids the information they need and inspire them to do their part to fight the climate emergency.

All the Feelings Under the Sun: How to Deal With Climate Change by Leslie Davenport,

All the Feelings Under the Sun: How to Deal With Climate Change is a timely, thoughtful workbook that will help young readers work through their feelings of anxiety about climate change. Through informative text and activities, the book gives children age-appropriate information about the climate crisis and gives them the tools they need to manage their anxiety and work toward making change.

Hot Planet: How Climate Change is Harming Our World by Anna Claybourne

Hot Planet offers young readers the perfect, non-alarmist introduction to Earth’s climate change crisis. Climate change is a reality in today’s world. From melting ice caps to forest fires, climate change is responsible for dramatic freak weather events and Earth is now warmer than it has been at any point in the last 650,000 years. Hot Planet aims to raise readers aged nine and up’s awareness of the challenges of climate change in a non-alarmist, yet realistic, way. It explores what climate change is, what is believed to cause it, its current impact on the world and what might happen in the future if it progresses at current rates. It also highlights the social inequality of climate change, as richer and more industrialised countries contribute far more heavily to climate change through their energy consumption, yet poorer, less developed nations are currently much more affected by it. The book looks ahead at how we can all help combat the climate change crisis, from global changes such as investing in sustainable energy sources to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, to green schemes such as carbon pricing, to practical solutions such as eating less meat and using public transport or cycling, rather than driving.

The Australian Climate Change Book: Be Informed and Make a Difference by Polly Marsden

The Australian Climate Change Book is an accessible and reassuring picture book that teaches children about the specific challenges of climate change for Australia so they can be informed and make a difference. Australia is a unique and incredibly diverse natural environment and we are oh-so-lucky to live here. Our country is home to a great number of amazing ecosystems. But things like fossil fuels, greenhouse gases and deforestation are creating imbalances in our ecosystems and causing climate change. Climate change leads to all sorts of crazy weather and damage to our natural environments and wildlife habitats. But it’s not too late to fix it. Even small steps can make a difference and you have the power to help. A practical and reassuring book for children to help them understand climate change and the ways in which they can make a difference.

Kids Fight Climate Change by Martin Dorey

Children can help save planet Earth with these positive, climate-focused missions from best-selling author and eco-warrior Martin Dorey.

Our planet is in trouble. But with the help of this book, every kid can be a superhero making a difference. Sixty engaging missions guide readers through making carbon-saving changes in all aspects of their lives, from gardening to gadgets -even a DIY water-saving device for their toilet tank. Aided by lively illustrations, Martin Dorey weaves crucial climate statistics and helpful resources with stories of positive change already happening, such as the resurgence of the Eurasian beaver due to conservation efforts. Along the way, readers meet other superheroes, both animal and human, who are changing the world too. With advice about speaking up and inspiring others to join in, veteran environmentalist Martin Dorey infuses optimism and encouragement into this essential guide to saving Earth, two minutes at a time.

We have also found this kurzgesagt video a great help in discussing climate change with our children. It gives hope to our children without sugar coating over the seriousness of the issues.

Enjoy!

Ted Talk: 3 Strategies for Effectively Talking About Climate Change

Which sounds more urgent: “global warming” or “pollution blanket overheating planet”? In this actionable talk, communications strategist John Marshall explains why we need to rethink how we talk about climate change and offers small but mighty language adjustments to get people to more intuitively understand and care about this existential threat.

Click through to watch.

Climate Change: What can be done at home? Six Books that show us how we can help

Sometimes the idea of making small changes at home to help the environment can feel so small and insignificant that we begin to wonder if they really are helping. Good news. We have found six amazing books that show that your small changes really do make a big difference. What’s even better, is that they each outline a number of new and inventive ways we can change our behaviour for lasting impact.

Net Zero: How We Stop Causing Climate Change by Dieter Helm

What can we really do about the climate emergency? The inconvenient truth is that we are causing the climate crisis with our carbon intensive lifestyles and that fixing, or even just slowing, it will affect all of us. But it can be done. In Net Zero the economist Professor Dieter Helm addresses the action we would all need to take, whether personal, local, national or global, if we really wanted to stop causing climate change. Net Zero is Professor Dieter Helm’s measured, balanced view of how we stop causing climate change by adopting a net zero strategy of reducing carbon emissions and increasing carbon absorption. It is a rational look at why the past 30 years efforts has failed and why and how the next 30 years can succeed. It is a vital book for anyone who hears the clamour of Extinction Rebellion and other ecological activists, but wonders what they can actually do.

How to Garden the Low-carbon Way: The steps you can take to help combat climate change by Sally Nex

Keen on starting your own garden but unsure about your environmental impact? This guide will give you practical advice on which soil to use, plants that are best for absorbing carbon dioxide, low-carbon fertilisers, and cutting out single-use plastic. What’s more, this garden book is completely backed by scientific research! Explore the benefits of no-dig gardening, how to use fewer plants, using hedges instead of fences and how to grow shrubs that support wildlife.

This is a fantastic gardening book with a simple, step-by-step guide to either learn about gardening or to reference as your garden grows. You’ll quickly become acquainted with the benefits of growing a garden that positively contributes to the environment. Plus, you’ll have all the fun rewards a gardening hobby has to offer.

Things You Can Do: How to Fight Climate Change and Reduce Waste by
Eduardo Garcia

Award-winning climate journalist Eduardo Garcia offers a deeply researched and user-friendly guide to the things we can do every day to fight climate change. Based on his popular New York Times column “One Thing You Can Do,” this fully illustrated book proposes simple solutions for an overwhelming problem. No lectures here, just accessible and inspiring ideas to slash emissions and waste in our daily lives. In each chapter, Garcia digs into the issue, explaining how everyday choices lead to carbon emissions, then delivers a wealth of things you can do to make a positive impact. Things You Can Do is the book for people who want to know and do more to save the planet.

Kiss the Ground: How the Food You Eat Can Reverse Climate Change, Heal Your Body & Ultimately Save Our World by Josh Tickell

Kiss the Ground explains an incredible truth: by changing our diets to a soil-nourishing, regenerative agriculture diet, we can reverse global warming, harvest healthy, abundant food, and eliminate the poisonous substances that are harming our children, pets, bodies, and ultimately our planet. This richly visual look at the impact of an under-appreciated but essential resource, the very ground that feeds us, features fascinating and accessible interviews with celebrity chefs, ranchers, farmers, and top scientists. Kiss the Ground teaches you how to become an agent in humanity’s single most important and time-sensitive mission: reverse climate change and effectively save the world-all through the choices you make in how and what to eat.

Sustainable Home: Practical projects, tips and advice for maintaining a more eco-friendly household by Christine Liu

Sustainable Home is an oldie but a goodie. It is an inspirational and practical guidebook to maintaining a more environmentally friendly household. Sustainability enthusiast and zero-waste advocate Christine Liu takes you on a tour through the rooms of your home – the living area, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom – offering tips, tricks and 17 step-by-step projects designed to help you lead a more low-impact lifestyle. Whether it is by making your own toothpowder, growing your own herb garden or up-cycling old pieces of furniture, there are numerous ways – both big and small – to make a difference.

Remodelista – The Low-Impact Home: A Sourcebook for Stylish, Eco-Conscious
Living
by Margot Guralnick and Fan Winston

Low-impact living is about making thoughtful, eco-friendly choices in your home. But being sustainable doesn’t have to mean sacrificing style. That’s where Remodelista comes in. In this comprehensive guide, they decode the secrets to creating a home that’s good for the planet – and totally liveable. First, the team invites readers on in-depth tours of the living quarters of a dozen homeowners who have interpreted this ethos in myriad ways: an Australian architect’s state-of-the-art family home, a rental apartment in Brooklyn outfitted with materials salvaged from the neighbourhood, and even a farmhouse in England made of hemp. Then they take us room by room to dissect the most impactful swaps we can make for a healthier home, from a gentler laundry routine courtesy of the Celsious sisters to chef David Tanis’s low-tech approach to cooking. There are simple DIY projects to encourage you to reuse and repurpose rather than buy new, plus the ‘Vintage 75’ – a roundup of everyday household goods that are easy to find used, and are typically better made and more affordable than their brand-new counterparts. And, of course, there’s remodelling advice for all budgets and scopes: whether you’re looking to choose healthy paint, swap out your rug, upgrade your windows, or overhaul your whole place. It all adds up to an eco-conscious approach that’s about living not only responsibly but also with joy and style. This book is so new, it’s not even out yet. Fear not, you can click through the hyperlinks to pre-order it. 

Enjoy!

Climate Change Crusaders, the voices challenging the way we treat our world 

Climate Change is not a new issue, nor is it going to fix itself without our education, action and attention. There are a number of individuals and groups that have been trying to get society’s attention to take action for years. Some have made an impact quickly and have roused us to protest, change our behaviour and expect more from each other. Today we’re sharing six books tackling this topic in very different ways, one shows how their family has been impacted, another teaches us how to discuss this important topic and others outline how the world will look should we choose to ignore it.

How to Talk About Climate Change in a Way That Makes a Difference by Rebecca Huntley

Why is it so hard to talk about climate change? While scientists double down on the shocking figures, we still find ourselves unable to discuss climate change meaningfully among friends and neighbours or even to grapple with it ourselves. The key to progress on climate change is in the psychology of human attitudes and our ability to change. Whether you’re already alarmed and engaged with the issue, concerned but disengaged, a passive skeptic or an active denier, understanding our emotional reactions to climate change – why it makes us anxious, fearful, angry or detached – is critical to coping on an individual level and convincing each other to act. This book is about understanding why people who aren’t like you feel the way they do and learning to talk to them effectively. What we need are thousands – millions – of everyday conversations about the climate to enlarge the ranks of the concerned, engage the disengaged and persuade the cautious of the need for action.

Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change by Nathaniel Rich 

By 1979, we knew all that we know now about the science of climate change; what was happening, why it was happening, and how to stop it. Over the next ten years, we also had the very real opportunity to stop it. Obviously, we failed. Nathaniel Rich’s groundbreaking account of that failure and how tantalisingly close we came to signing binding treaties that would have saved us all before the fossil fuels industry and politicians committed to anti-scientific denialism, is already a journalistic blockbuster, a full issue of the New York Times Magazine that has earned favourable comparisons to Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and John Hersey’s Hiroshima. In the book Losing Earth, Rich provides more of the context for what did, and didn’t, happen in the 1980s and, more important, is able to carry the story fully into the present day and wrestle with what those past failures mean for us today. It is not just an agonising revelation of historical missed opportunities, but a clear-eyed and eloquent assessment of how we got to now, and what we can and must do before it is truly too late.

Hot Air: The Inside Story of the Battle Against Climate Change Denial by Peter Stott 

Hot Air is the shocking inside story of the fight to halt climate change over the past twenty-five years by a world-renowned scientist, Peter Stott. Ours is the age of global warming. Rising sea levels, extreme weather, forest fires. Dire warnings are everywhere, so why has it taken so long for the crisis to be recognised? Here, for the first time, climate scientist Peter Stott reveals the bitter fight to get international recognition for what, among scientists, has been known for decades: human activity causes climate change. Hot Air is the urgent story of how the science was developed, how it has been repeatedly sabotaged and why humanity hasn’t a second to spare in the fight to halt climate change.

Climate: Powerful Voices, Inspiring Ideas by Christina Limpert

With climate change at the forefront of current discussion, Words of change in Climate offers a curated collection of thought-provoking quotes and passages from the writings and speeches of activists in the environmental community, with a focus on diverse and previously unheard voices.

Compiled by social scientist and researcher Christina Limpert, this collection of stirring words is intended to enlighten, to prompt change, to provide encouragement, and to deepen readers’ conviction. Celebrating activism, focusing on solutions, and avoiding apathy and pessimism, this book is call to action. The back matter includes a brief bio for each person quoted to provide context for their life and work.

Stand Up! Speak Up! A Story Inspired by the Climate Change Revolution by Andrew Joyner

From a #1 New York Times bestselling illustrator, and the creator of The Pink Hat, comes a timely picture book about a young girl’s mission to inspire others to help the planet. Celebrate young climate change activists in this charming story about an empowered girl who shows up, listens up, and ultimately, speaks up to inspire her community to take action against climate change. After attending a climate march, a young activist is motivated to make an effort and do her part to help the planet… by organising volunteers to work to make green changes in their community, from cleaning a lake, to planting trees, to making composting bins, to hosting a clothing swap and more! Here is an uplifting picture book that is an important reminder that no change is too small, and no person is too young, to make a difference. With simple text and lively illustrations, Andrew Joyner has given young children a timely story about activism, community, and hope.

In a few weeks we will be sharing more books on how to talk to children about climate change so be sure to check back again for more titles.

Our House is on Fire: Scenes of a Family and a Planet in Crisis by Malena Ernman, Greta Thunberg, Beata Ernman, Svante Thunberg

The profoundly moving story of how love, courage and determination brought Greta Thunberg’s family back from the brink. This is the story of a happy family whose life suddenly fell apart, never to be the same again. Of two devoted parents plunged into a waking nightmare as their eleven-year-old daughter Greta stopped speaking and eating, and her younger sister struggled to cope. They desperately searched for answers, and began to see how their children’s suffering reached far beyond medical diagnoses. This crisis was not theirs alone: they were burned-out people on a burned-out planet. And so they decided to act. Our House is on Fire shows how, amid forces that tried to silence them, one family found ways to strengthen, heal, and gain courage from the love they had for each other and for the living world. It is a parable of hope and determination in an emergency that affects us all.

You can read other titles by Greta Thunberg here.

Next week on the blog we’ll be sharing six books offering suggestions as to what changes we can do at home to aid the future of the planet. 

Enjoy!