Friday, October 25, 2024

Look Up - Stars Are Falling!

 The annual Orionids meteor shower has been happening this week, and is predicted to peak this weekend. Just how many meteors are we talking about? According to the Washington Post, meteorologists are expecting about 23 meteors to shoot across the sky every hour. I can't think of a better time to check out this book!

The Meteor Shower: Kaleidoscope Club  
by Marie Mazas; illus by Joëlle Passeron 
128 pages; ages 7-10
‎Blue Dot Kids Press, 2024

This is book two in this fun, STEAM adventure series and Nour and August, best friends and tree-house engineers, are at it again. This time they are drawing up plans to build something cool for watching the meteor shower. But first, they need to convince the Mayor to turn off the lights so they can have a dark-sky night. There’s already a law on the books that requires public lighting – street lights, public buildings, monuments – to be off between 1 and 7 am in an effort to reduce energy consumption. But nobody is enforcing the law, and the Mayor isn’t interested in pushing the issue.

So Nour and August engage in a flyer campaign: Keep the Stars Bright! Turn off Your Lights! This is a bold initiative for August, who is afraid of the dark. 

Just as the community seems to rally around the Dark Night idea, a fair moves into town. People have been waiting for the carnival rides and the games for a whole year – but the carnival lights threaten Nour and August’s efforts for stargazing. And an unlikely friendship threatens the Kaleidoscope Club.


What I like about the book is that it focuses on problem-solving and includes lots of STEM stuff: 
  • designing and building a model space capsule using recycled materials (engineering, art);
  • migration and light pollution (biology, conservation science);
  • meteors and constellations (astronomy); and
  • kitchen chemistry
I also like the back matter, which discusses in more depth how light pollution disrupts animal ecosystems, wastes energy, and even affects human health. And there’s a list of “what you can do” about it.

Thanks for dropping by today – and remember to watch for the meteor shower this weekend!. On Monday we'll be hanging out at Marvelous Middle Grade Monday with other  bloggers. It's over at Greg Pattridge's blog, Always in the Middle, so hop over to see what other people are reading. Review copy provided by the publisher.


8 comments:

  1. I love meteor showers! Hope to see some this week. This does sound like the perfect book to read when meteor showers are passing through!

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  2. I've never seen a meteor shower but it sounds magical! This story sounds a great read, and a super way for kids to learn about these things (engineering, conservation, astronomy, etc). Thanks for sharing!

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  3. This sounds really cool! I just discovered that my dad has a small telescope, so this might be a great way to stir up some interest in that and learn along the way, too. :) Thanks for your review!

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  4. 23 meteor showers in an hour. Wow! You picked a perfect book for this week.

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  5. What a wonderful resource about meteor showers.

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  6. What a great format for learning about meteor showers. The layout looks very appealing. I'll be looking to read this one and hopefully see a meteor shower some day.

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  7. Oh, this sounds like a fantastic book! thanks for highlighting it. Carol Baldwin

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  8. What a great idea for a story! Kids should love this one, and I think I will too. Thanks for the post.

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