How To Change Everything

YA nonfiction 

     "You and your generation, and the generations yet to come, have done nothing to create the crisis of climate change, but you will live with the worst effects of it--unless we change things."

     That is the double message of Naomi Klein's How To Change Everything: The Young Human's Guide To Protecting The Planet And Each Other.  Things are bad and getting worse.  However, although not all change is reversible, total catastrophe can be averted IF we all get on board and work together.

     You may have read or at least heard of Klein's books for adult adults.  Now she's bringing her message of necessary change to the YA set.  And it's the best book of it's type I've ever seen.  We've been sugarcoating what we tell kids, teens, and young adults far too long.  They know more than we are willing to admit to others or ourselves.  They see the writing on the wall and are undeterred by incrementalism inclinations or being beholden to government or big business.  I should know.  That's the age group I work with.

     Although compact, How To Change Everything is truly comprehensive.  It describes the current situation and all the threads across time that have led to the precariousness we're now in.  It delineates all that needs to be done and provides much needed stories of ways people have changed things for the better.

     It ends on a note of realistic hope.  

     "The pandemic tested us in every way.  It also showed us once again that big, rapid changes in society's direction are possible.  It is possible, in fact, to change Everything.  Our challenge now is to use that creativity and energy, and those resources, not only against COVID-19 but also against climate change and injustice, and for a fairer future."

     This book is a must acquire for school and public libraries and a must read for adults who work with and love kids, teens, and young adults.  Yes, parents, this includes you.

     I'd also expand the general readership well beyond its target demographics.  We are no longer a nation of readers.  I found this book much more manageable and engaging than Klein's adult adult volumes.  And I read at the graduate school level and have just had a piece published in a professional journal.

     Actually most of the best books being published these days, both fiction and nonfiction, are YA.  More savvy readers than you probably think cross the aisle on a regular basis.  If you haven't, try it.  You might like what you find.

On a purrrsonal note, my piece, a carefully targeted review of How The Other Half Eats, was just published in the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development.  My first professional publication but not my last.  The first, though, feels so special. (Jules)

Climate change is very hard on those of us who wear fur coats.  ( Tobago)

A great big shout out goes out to Naomi Klein for bringing readers this much needed message.

Tobago and Jules Hathaway 

     

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