AN EARTH-BOT'S SOLUTION TO PLASTIC POLLUTION

A young Earth-Bot wakes up to ocean plastic pollution.

Neo and his grandfather, both Earth-Bots, live at the ocean’s edge. Both have round, cartoon faces and matter-of-factly wear spacesuit helmets throughout. Grandpa instructs Neo to clean his plastic-infested room, but Neo fixates on video games. After Grandpa heads out for the day, Neo’s blissful gaming session is repeatedly interrupted. First a seal and later a penguin and a turtle implore Neo to help clean up the plastic pollution in the neighboring ocean. Neo initially insists he is too busy protecting the planet within his video game, but eventually he helps the animals. Spare illustrations are placed on blue or white backgrounds, with thin black outlines around characters and objects. A neat grid of plastic bottles outlined in white overlays ocean scenes, demonstrating the problem’s scale. However, the illustrations’ minimalism works against the story’s overall effectiveness; when Neo is confronted by the ocean’s mess, his facial expression doesn’t noticeably signal alarm. Neo’s video game strategies come in handy when he assesses that the plastic-pollution issue cannot be solved by one person alone, a detail that saves the story from a video games–are-negative binary but not from a sense that it’s basically treading water. A concluding note promotes personal actions with an emphasis on reducing initial plastics consumption instead of leaning on recycling as a single solution. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

A recycled storyline without enough twists to feel new.