Ally Baby Can: Be an Eco-Activist by Jade Orlando, Nyasha Williams
Series: Ally Baby Can #2
Published by HarperCollins on February 14, 2023
ISBN: 0063214563
Genres: Realistic Fiction
Format: Board Book
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The second in a series of Ally Baby books, this title addresses the language and activities surrounding eco-activism. From climate change to recycling efforts to planting trees and eating local food, many action verbs are highlighted: combat, plant, shop, ride, read, vote. Each word is accompanied by an example for action and illustrations of multi-cultural babies enjoying their tasks. The message is extremely important and the book offers many suggestions for being an ecological ally, but it uses babies to deliver sophisticated vocabulary and concepts. This makes it hard to know the audience for the book. Do elementary students, or adults, want to be lectured by babies? With words like “regenerative” and “sustainable”, are we supposed to read this book to babies? And even with such an important message, a title like this is a trigger for people who feel that children are being indoctrinated with a woke agenda. The publisher totes this as a “rhyming text” but the rhyme is quite thin and the book would have been better served with unrhymed prose. The end matter defines what it means to be an ally, offers a recap of the actions taken in the book (by the babies), and provides an extensive glossary and a short bibliography. Purchase this if you have a need for an all-in-one text that defines eco-activism and illustrates specific actions that can be taken to promote eco-activism; otherwise, it might be better to skip this one.

Reviewed by Jill O’Connor, Falmouth Middle School