Global by Eoin Colfer and Andrew Donkin. Illus. by Giovanni Rigano

This is the story of two children, Sami, who lives in a coastal village in the Bay of Bengal, and Yuki, who lives in Northern Canada, inside the Arctic Circle. While they lead very different lives, both are impacted by global warming. Their stories alternate, ‘Here” Sami lives with his grandfather Solomon since his parents went missing during a cyclone which inundated their village. They have been forced to move along the coast and live in shelters built from debris since losing their village. Sami helps his grandfather fish for a living but they have to struggle with other displaced villagers, crowded fishing grounds and few fish. 'There' Yuki lives in a comfortable home with professional working parents. She goes to school, has a mobile phone, a best friend and a dog called Lockjaw. Yuki is concerned by the plight of polar bears, native to the region, which are encroaching on human settlements due to the shrinking ice fields that make up their hunting grounds. We learn that brown bears from the south have been expanding northwards and cross breeding with polar bears to form a new hybrid species called Grolar bears. Yuki sets out to capture a picture of a Grolar bear for the local Conservation Center in the hope that they will be protected. Both children want to play an active part in their futures, Yuki to highlight the effect of climate change and Sami to change his small family’s luck. Their stories are told through alternating chapters, with helpful colour coded text boxes to augment the speech bubbles. The stories are both dramatic with expert use of varying points of view and subtly different colour palettes for the two narratives but they sit awkwardly together, their lives are so far apart, not only geographically but in matters of survival.

As I was writing this review another cyclone hit the Bay of Bengal area highlighting the plight of children like Sami. One review stated that the children were 'equally affected by global warming' but there is nothing equal about their stories and I would have enjoyed them more as two separate books. There is graphically presented information at the end about global warming that could be useful for teachers. A follow up to Eoin Colfer and Andrew Donkin's Illegal, this beautifully presented book successfully puts an accessible and personal face to the issue of global warming.

Themes: Global warming, Displacement, Polar bears, Climate change.

Sue Speck