Every Last Drop

February 3, 2014
Writing with candor as well as some humor, Mulder gently urges readers who live in the developed world to never take fresh water for granted in this addition to the Orca Footprint ecology series. Chapters focus on the history of human efforts to harness and clean water, the water cycle, and how world nations have found innovative methods to access water (for example, in the Kalahari Desert in Botswana, families remove the salt from their water using desalinating devices run on sunlight). Photographs of individuals from around the world collecting and using water put the topic in vivid focus, as do statistics that note that one in six people “don’t have access to clean water. Almost half of those people live in Africa.” Ages 8–12.

February 15, 2015
To dumpster dive, to glean, perchance to dream of a zero-waste world.Mulder tells the garbage story in clean and engrossing prose, complemented by stock artwork and photographs. Humans have always made trash-eat that wooly mammoth leg, and you are left with a wooly mammoth bone-though trash production took off exponentially with the establishment of settled communities. What is trash, asks Mulder? Trash is something that no longer is useful. But use is in the eye of the beholder. An empty yogurt container could be chucked out the car window, or it could serve as a pencil holder. Old jeans can be used for housing insulation, as can tires or books or, weirdly, toothbrushes. Mulder provides all sorts of alternatives to incineration, landfills and ocean dumping. She explorers the cons of recycling-it can produce as much methane as cows; it consumes a lot of energy; it results in an often weakened product-as well as many pros, and she throws in plenty of mind-twisting sidebars: Yes, those styrene containers keeping your fast-food burger warm may well be serving you a dose of brain damage. Ultimately Mulder suggests we not make it in the first place. Enclosed in these pages is plenty of food for thought and examples for direct action. (Nonfiction. 8-12)

April 1, 2015

Gr 5-7-Both a history of trash and a manual of its elimination (or diminution, at least), this nifty book covers a variety of topics, from the trash pits (think archaic sanitary landfills) of the ancient Minoans to the gross filth of New York City in 1850. Employing readable language, Mulder chronicles the development of garbage disposal and goes on to castigate our throw-it-away-and-buy-a-new-one way of thinking. She discusses reformatting, reusing, and repairing to lessen the landfill burdens and presents ways to cut down the enormous amounts of rubbish humans produce on a global daily basis. "Trash Facts" pop up, as do "Take in the Trash" notes. Colorful photos record garbage issues around the world and innovative solutions to cope with this mountainous problem. Pair this with such green titles as Kim McKay and Jenny Bonnin's challenging True Green Kids: 100 Things You Can Do to Save the Planet (National Geographic, 2008) and Brad Herzog's simpler but eye-catching S Is for Save the Planet: A How-to-Be-Green Alphabet (Sleeping Bear, 2009) for a further look at our smelly, bulky accumulations and inventive ways to change our wasteful ways. VERDICT An informative call to action for young greenies.-Patricia Manning, formerly at Eastchester Public Library, NY

Copyright 2015 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2014
Grades 4-7 As with her previous titles about sustainable transportation and energy, Mulder begins this book by relating her personal experience with the topic, including a severe illness after drinking contaminated water in Peru. She then looks at the management of clean water and sewage throughout history, from the earliest wells in Cyprus to the Minoans' first flush toilets (unfortunately forgotten when they were conquered by the Mycenaeans). Other loosely related chapters examine how clean water is delivered to North American homes; natural ways, such as wetlands, that the environment cleans water; and global innovations to collect fresh water and remove microbes, poisons, and salt. Young people will be amazed by the global initiatives: filtering arsenic-contaminated water in Bangladesh with iron nails, harvesting fog to gather fresh water in Chile, and more. Catchy Go with the Flow headings, startling water facts, and color photos of children collecting and conserving water around the world make this high-interest reading.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2014
Divided into four chapters, this book explores the history of water use by humans; the natural cycle of water on earth; how people access, clean, and desalinate water; and ways in which we can conserve and preserve our water resources. Plenty of well-captioned photos, including some from the author's own travels, illustrate and personalize the accessible text. Reading list, websites. Ind.

(Copyright 2014 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

Starred review from April 1, 2014

Gr 4-6-Mulder's latest addition to her solid repertoire of environmentally conscious books addresses the crises (pollution, shortages, etc.) of the global water supply. Her conversational style keeps the material from being too clinical or gloom-and-doom, without ever seeming superficial. Ideal for reports, the book is packed with great information on everything from the way civilizations have collected and used water throughout history, sobering assessments of the present and future availability of clean water, and intriguing solutions already employed, such as fog catchers, or that are still in their experimental stages. Worthwhile factoids, sidebars, and interesting photographs accompanied by instructive captions add to the abundance of meaningful material. Mulder is honest about the emergency unfolding around this precious resource, and though the situation is fairly dire, she empowers her readers by offering feasible suggestions that individuals can use to improve things. And like raindrops falling into a collection barrel, each and every single conscientious action adds up. An excellent resource on the topic.-Alyson Low, Fayetteville Public Library, AR

Copyright 2014 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2014
You turn a tap. The water flows: clean and, if not abundantly, at least steadily. You are the lucky one in two humans. Mulder's book will make readers stop and calculate. Not only does half the world's population not have a ready water supply, but often what they do have is filthy--perhaps contaminated with microbes and arsenic--or plain poisonous. This account is particularly handy, as it goes back to the beginning, to the water cycle and the humans harvesting water: how it has been collected and distributed throughout history. The great Middle Eastern and European aqueducts, the deep wells, dew nets--truly feats of engineering marvel. It moves through the Middle Ages and, with them, the real start of water contamination and the spread of water-borne disease. Lavishly illustrated with everything from woodcuts to photographs, the book is far from downbeat and scolding. Much is being done to source and purify water, and much is also being done to work on the sanitation issue. Mulder writes with a clean, no-nonsense style that demonstrates that people have finally come around to realizing that only 1 percent of the water on Earth is potable and we must be careful of this resource. Informative, attractive and alarming--readers will think twice before leaving the water running as they brush their teeth. (Nonfiction. 8-12)

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