"Dust that paints the sky.
Dust that soars across West Africa.
Dust that rides the wind
over the Atlantic Ocean, where ...
it sifts into the water,
providing nutrients
that help the sea make the air we breathe."
It is truly amazing to learn what nature has to teach us about our planet and the things that happen here. I love that there is always something new to learn in the pages of picture books for children. I had briefly read about the dust that finds its way from the Sahara across the globe to the Amazon River. So, I was very interested to know more.
Ms. Brockenbrough invites readers to consider the true beauty of nature and the connections it makes. She begins in our homes where dust can be seen in the rays of sunlight that make their way through our windows, and then explains that some dust has a very different story to tell. A green trout lives life in an African lake until it dies, the lake shrinks and the trout becomes a fossil along with the creatures it once consumed. A wind blows those fossils from their resting place as dust into the air, and all the way across the ocean where it feeds plankton, which is eaten by many ocean creatures. That dust eventually makes its way from a very dry desert to the lush humidity of the Amazon Rainforest.
The rainfall there strips the land of the phosphorus needed for plant growth; the dust replenishes it. There is so much dust it can be seen from outer space.
"Huge.
The dust plume can weigh more than
twenty-four million school buses,
or one hundred and twenty million
female hippos, or almost 262 billion
basketballs."
Wrap your head around that comparison!
From the Amazon, it travels to the Caribbean, then the United States ... and even further. It's hard to believe, isn't it? Back matter includes further information about the dust, and sites for further study. Informative and accessible, the book makes an even bigger impression thanks to the beauty found in the magnificent artwork created by Juana Martinez-Neal using pastels, colored pencils, acrylics, gesso and fabric on hand-textured paper. Every spread demands careful attention to the story being told. The changing perspectives add depth for understanding and bring the words to glorious life.
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