My Wounded Island by Jacques Pasquet is translated from the French by Sophie B Watson. It evokes feelings of sadness and regret over the land and nature loss due to man's irresponsible care for the environment. A little girl who lives on a speck of an island in Alaska is afraid of the threat of a monster that is attacking her island home seeking to destroy her people's way of life. It is a realistic tale, full of a girl's imaginings and Inuit community battling land erosion in ethereally drawn illustrations that are haunting and could frighten a little child. This finds space in folk collections, and environmental collections. Mother Nature can make refugees of people. There are Inupiat words that are a little difficult to read, although there is a glossary towards the end of the book with a short list of some of them. Good for public libraries, school libraries, science and nature centers, and those who are environmentally minded.

I was interested in the content of this book. Learning about a different culture and their beliefs is something beneficial for not only children, but adults as well. The pictures in this read were vibrant and definitely eye-catching for young children. However, the overall message of this book confuses me. During the entire read, I felt it was dark and hopeless. It explains how this one girl scared of a sea monster. Yes, it mentions about global warming and how people affect this, but I don't think there really was a solution at the end. Overall, I feel the content may be better suited older children because it is rather dark and sad.

Stunningly illustrated environmental fable about coastal erosion.

From what I understand, the author is not Indigenous, so I am curious about what those from that island's culture think of his book, but as an outsider, it was an engaging children's story.

Beautiful illustrations and a very important message about climate refugees.

How do you explain climate refugees? Did you know there was such a thing? What do you think happens to those people that have to leave their homelands, and move because the land has ceased to exist?

In this very simple, beautiful picture book, a young child talks about how her island, the home she has known all her life, and there peoples have lived on, is slowly being eaten by a creature, that soon the island will be below the waves, and they will have to move, but to where? As her grandfather says, it is not just the island that dies, but the memories of those who came before, as well as their way of life.

We need to know these things. And in this beautiful picture book we see the damage the climet change is having to places in the world. Just because it isn't affect the first-world, yet, doesn't mean that it won't.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.