HRH Prince Charles has co-authored a new Ladybird book on Climate Change, part of a new series of 'Expert' titles.
Ladybird Books
There is a new Ladybird book, just out, about Climate Change. It has three authors, including HRH Prince Charles. It aims to educate with information about our warming world, the impacts we are already seeing and future worries. A look at the climatic past and causes of our current disruption, with the worldwide strains and possible solutions.
Ladybird books are a British institution, covering many subjects over the decades. There are the Ladybird Tales and Classics, including many traditional fairytales. The Read it yourself series for children, Peppa Pig and Topsy & Tim, and still present Peter & Jane. There is a wide selection of non-fiction books ranging from dinosaurs, wild flowers, World War 2, the weather to the Vikings. These are small sized books that just give a summary of any subject in a compact illustrated read.
To this day, Ladybird Books are known and loved the world over. For millions of people, they bring back the golden days of childhood – learning to read, discovering the magic of books, and growing up.
More recently, there have been Ladybird books for adults, the very successful "for Grown-ups series". Humorous, social comment on life in the 21st Century.
Climate Change
Climate change would seem a suitable new, more serious subject for a Ladybird book. It came about after Prince Charles returned to the UK from delivering the keynote address at the Paris Climate Change Summit (COP21) in December 2015. A plan began to produce a simple plain English guide to the subject, quite a controversial subject at that.
This book is co-written with Dr Emily Shuckburgh FRMetS, Deputy-Head of Polar Oceans at the British Antarctic Survey and Co-Chair of the Society’s Climate Science Communications Group, and Dr Tony Juniper, special Adviser to The Prince of Wales’s International Sustainability Unit.
This is one of three books being published this week in a new series of Ladybird Expert titles, so far including Quantum Mechanics and Evolution. This series is aimed at adults, but the Climate Change book could reach older children too. It is tricky to squash such a vast subject down into a 50-page small book. Getting the impacts on humans is very important to make the book's message get into people's heads. London should be very thankful to the Thames Barrier already, but how many realise that day to day. Also, trying to answer some of the other opinions and queries that are bandied about, such as it's just another natural cycle.
It does what it is supposed to; it gives an outline, a taster of a much wider subject. It piques interest too.
Climate debate
There is huge debate around climate change and at the request of the three authors, the Royal Met. Society was approached to co-ordinate a peer-review process by eminent academics, so as to certify the accuracy and robustness of the material presented in the book. It is the first time that a Ladybird book has been peer reviewed.
Will this little ladybird book manage to sow seeds of discussion, change and action against this year's new direction within the White House and the potential impacts on climate researchers? If POTUS Trump does come to the UK, surely HRH Prince Charles has to gift at least 5 copies to the Trump administration.
“We can’t take a four-year break,” says Marcia DeLonge at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) in Washington DC.
More climate discussion here in the Netweather Community Forum
