Wild about...

Some years ago, I had this idea for a children’s alphabet book about endangered animals. I researched it for a while, but I eventually abandoned the project because I couldn’t figure out how to make the book rigorous but not depressing. I’m glad to say that David McLimans manages to do both in Gone Wild: An Endangered Animal Alphabet.

Gone Wild takes the traditional alphabet book format and turns it into an introduction to 26 animals that are threatened with extinction. Each page of the book features one animal, listing its common name and scientific binomial name with a box containing a summary of its habitat, taxonomy, and the threats it faces, topped with a woodcut-style illustration. McLimans chose a nice mix of animals for the book, mixing large charismatic mammals and birds with small mammals, reptiles, amphibians, insects, and a fish. No one reading this book will come away with the impression that only animals like African elephants, giant pandas and Siberian tigers are endangered.

The main illustrations in the book are letters. (It is, after all, an alphabet book). Most of each page is dominated by a single large letter, which is rendered in black and white and playfully incorporates some part of the featured animal. An A becomes an alligator head viewed from above, a Q is made to look like the rear end of a spotted-tail quoll, and the top and bottom bars of the E bend inward to form an earwig’s paired cerci. The approach makes each page visually striking, and delighted the youngest member of our household (the book was recently named a Caldecott honor book). Readers who want to know more about these animals can turn to a series of short paragraphs at the end of the book for life history facts and a summary of why they’re endangered. The author also provides a reading list to help budding ecologists find out more.

Gone Wild: An Endangered Animal Alphabet
David McLimans
Walker & Company
2006