GENRE: *Lyrical, Informational Fiction
WORDS: 514
Query:
How did the most numerous birds in the world, whose flocks used to darken the sky for days as they flew over (not hyperbole), become extinct in a little over fifty years? This story has been with me for ten years since I attended a talk on the passenger pigeons on the 100th anniversary of the death of Martha, the last Passenger Pigeon. WHEN WE WERE MANY: THE PASSENGER PIGEONS’ STORY is a lyrical informational picture book with 514 words, paired with 723 words of expository layer text for children 6-10. The passenger pigeons, as a collective, tell the tale of their relationship to the land and humans, and how their number was their strength, as well as their undoing.
This story is timely given climate change and how the shifting environment makes it harder for animals to thrive, and the unusual narrator softens the sad story and is a reminder that we need our communities to thrive.
WHEN WE WERE MANY: THE PASSENGER PIGEONS’ STORY will be useful in classrooms for its STEM and social studies elements related to changing ecosystems, impact of invasive species and new technologies, as well as differences in cultural practices regarding the environment and conservation.
When not writing picture books and a chapter book series, I teach at the University of Maine. I’m a clinical psychologist by training and former child and family therapist, so I write a lot of SEL fiction and nonfiction. My first picture book How Are You, Verity? Illustrated by Taylor Barron was released by Magination Press in 2023. The chapter book series is based on the main character Verity, the nonbinary and autistic-affirming main character, who has quite a lot in common with me as a kid.
Thank you for considering my manuscript.
Excerpt:
We will tell you the story of when we were many.
On the darkest night, when the moon is new, and your eyes can see the blanket of stars,
imagine each a bird, a piece of a flock, one flock of our many.
At our fullest, our number was in the billions.
[Before European people colonized North America, passenger pigeons were the most numerous bird in North America]
What inspired you to write this story & what do you have in common with it:
I went to a 100th anniversary (of their extinction) talk by a researchers. I didn’t know how numerous those birds were. What are the odds that we push the most numerous bird into extinction?
1 Comment
Leave your reply.