Trash Talk, part of the Orca Footprints series, helps youth take small steps in order to make change. Filled with text features, this resource is accessible and engaging. As humans we’ve always had to deal with trash, and students can discover the various ways ancient civilizations dealt with the same issues we face today. With the industrial revolution, our waste began to increase. When plastic became a common material in everything from packaging to plates, landfills saw an increase in waste. Not only does this resource discuss ways to reduce, reuse, and recycle, it highlights innovative thinking and design when it comes to a zero-waste world. Using old fishing nets to make carpets, toothbrushes for house insulation, and junkyard items to create instruments are only a few of the creative ways to create treasure from trash. | Michelle Mulder is the author of numerous titles in the Orca Footprints series.

48 pp., 8 × 9.5", colour photographs and illustrations, b&w illustrations • Index

Source: Association of Book Publishers of BC - BC Books for Schools (2021-2022)

Michelle is the author of several books for children, and she enjoys telling the stories of kids who seize life's opportunities. When growing up in Port Moody, British Columbia, her favourite spot was the library. She loved cracking open the cover of a novel, taking a deep breath, and jumping into another life.

At university, Michelle studied literature, and between courses, she helped dig a water pipeline in the Dominican Republic and flipped burgers for a summer at a McDonald's in Germany. After graduating, she cycled 6000 kilometres across Canada, became a travel writer, taught creative writing in the Arctic, and worked as a simulated patient for medical students to practice on. She also married the pen pal that she'd been writing to since she was fourteen years old, and together they traveled around his home country of Argentina.

Michelle began writing for kids because she's always loved reading children's books. These days, when she's not writing or going on adventures, she enjoys reading, swimming, baking, hiking, and pedaling her bicycle around Victoria, British Columbia, where she lives with her husband and daughter. For more information about Michelle and her books, please visit her website at www.michellemulder.com.

 

Michelle Mulder's profile page

• Commended, BC Books for BC Schools
• Nominated, Young Readers' Choice Book Awards of British Columbia (YRCABC) Red Cedar Book Awards
• Short-listed, Hackmatack Children’s Choice Book Award
• Short-listed, Canadian Library Association (CLA) Book of the Year for Children
• Commended, Northland College Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Awards (SONWA) - Young Adult
• Nominated, Forest of Reading Blue Spruce Award
• Nominated, American Association for the Advancement of Science(AAAS)/Subaru SB&F Prize for Excellence in Science Books

"Mulder tells the garbage story in clean and engrossing prose, complemented by stock artwork and photographs...Mulder provides all sorts of alternatives to incineration, landfills and ocean dumping...Enclosed in these pages is plenty of food for thought and examples for direct action."

Kirkus Reviews

"The text is written in a conversational style which will appeal to readers. 'Trash Facts' provide additional trivia while colour photographs, perfectly suited to the text, add to the reader’s understanding of the concepts presented...An interesting, thought-provoking book that might inspire some readers to spark some environmental initiatives of their own. Highly Recommended."

CM Magazine

"I look forward with great anticipation to each new Orca Footprints [title]. They have been beautifully designed, well researched and blessed with terrific writing. This one is no exception...[Mulder] includes personal observations and anecdotes from her travels and from her life in Victoria today to make us cognizant of simple solutions to some of the ways in which we dispose of unwanted and unneeded objects. The 'Trash Facts' are interesting and inspiring. A wealth of impressive color photos, a table of contents, an index and a list of additional books, movies and websites add to the appeal and to the value."

Sal's Fiction Addiction blog

"Although the problem is huge, the author writes in a positive and upbeat style and encourages readers to be creative in thinking of solutions. The book is illustrated with many, high quality, colour photographs. There are references to other current resources, including movies and websites, for further study."

Resource Links

"There is a nice balance of text and vibrant photos; content is a blend of scientific fact with historical and anecdotal vignettes so that adolescents can relate to the issues while contributing to a solution. Mulder presents an array of solutions, along with several examples of innovative projects demonstrating recycling, reusing, and composting. Due to the relevancy of the topic and clear message to modern teens and pre-teens, this is a valuable purchase for most youth collections."

School Library Connection

"Mulder focuses not only on reducing consumption but also on how we can recoup some of the energy and resources that are thrown away. Ingenious ideas like insulating homes with jeans or weaving old fishing nets into carpeting are just a couple ideas that will spark readers’ imaginations. With full-color photos of kids in action and startling but fascinating trivia about how much trash the world’s population produces, this offers a very compelling argument for conservation."

Booklist

"Both a history of trash and a manual of its elimination (or diminution, at least), this nifty book covers a variety of topics...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...Colorful photos record garbage issues around the world and innovative solutions to cope with this mountainous problem...An informative call to action for young greenies."

School Library Journal

"[An] important title on how to value our environment."

Coombs Report Summer Reading List for Kids