Environmental Themes as Backdrop for Children’s Fiction – Sophie McKenzie

Guest Post: Sophie McKenzie

Author of Storm Of Lies

Writing Environmental Themes as Backdrop for Children’s Fiction

Writing Children’s Books With Environmental Themes

Storm of Lies is the second standalone book that I’ve written with an environmental theme at its heart. The first was Truth or Dare (pub 2022) which put industrial pollution in the spotlight. In Storm of Lies the focus is on extreme weather events, specifically the threat of a tsunami hitting the south coast of England.

It’s now widely accepted that post-Industrial Revolution increases in greenhouse gases have led to rising temperatures and, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s Sixth Assessment Report released in 2021, “ increased the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events”. The effect of these changes has already been profound, particularly for some developing nations. But it’s easy to minimise the potential impact on the UK. I found an article by Sir David King, former chief scientific adviser to the UK government and founder of the Centre for Climate Repair at Cambridge University, which suggests that a landslide in the Canary Islands might cause a mega tsunami which could hit the south coast of England. The article contains the following quote, about the likelihood of this tsunami, which I’ve used at the start of my book: “It could happen in ten thousand years’ time, but it could also happen tomorrow…”

It Could Happen Tomorrow

It was that “tomorrow” that caught my eye and linked perfectly with the desire I already had to write about a devastating natural event, not in some distant or dystopian future, but in our known world, in the present day.

At the start of Storm of Lies, Hollie and her friends stumble across evidence that suggests the local seawall, recently renovated by the company Hollie’s cash-strapped single mum works for, has been made using inferior materials. Hollie is convinced that, when a big storm comes, the seawall will not protect their town of Salthaven. Unfortunately, nobody believes her…

It Is Not Our Childen’s Job To Save The Planet…

I had two core aims as I wrote. The first of these was to make Hollie’s story entertaining, avoiding any hint of a morality tale and leaving readers free to think for themselves about the issues raised. I knew I needed to build my story around a high-octane plot, some human corruption and, most important of all, a trio of courageous and passionate teenagers.

My second and equally important aim was to avoid writing a doom-laden story that puts the responsibility for saving the planet in the hands of the next generation. It is NOT our children’s job to “save the planet” and I really dislike stories, projects and messaging which suggests that kids are “failing” in some way if they take – or don’t take – certain actions.

Environmental Context as Backdrop

I think that feeds into a wider sense that it’s all about re-cycling our household plastics and reducing our individual carbon footprints. Sure, those are valuable contributions, but proper and lasting changes can only be made at national and international level. For Storm of Lies my aim was to give the central teenage characters: Hollie, Parker and Rex, an adventure to go on, a crime to solve and a series of epic dangers to escape from. The environmental context is the backdrop for their story, not the story itself.

I got totally swept along with the action as I wrote – and that’s the feeling I’m hoping to give readers!