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Dear Wild Child by Wallace J. Nichols and Wallace Grayce Nichols, illustrated by Drew Beckmeyer

Source: Media Masters Publicity
Hardcover, 32 pgs.
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Dear Wild Child: You Carry Your Home Inside You by Wallace J. Nichols and Dr. Wallace Grayce Nichols, illustrated by Drew Beckmeyer, is based on a letter from a father to a grown daughter after the 2020 CZU Lightning Complex Fires destroyed her childhood home on the Slow Coast north of Santa Cruz, California, following a brilliant lightning storm.

The book opens before the birth of the child in the story, as the parents are planning and designing their home in the redwoods. The illustration of the house as a patchwork of trees is beautiful and abstract. Opening up to the inside of the home, it’s cozy and filled with books and music and love. Like the strength of the trees making up the floors and walls of the house, the young girl grows stronger each day, learning to sing, and enjoy nature, and explore all that the woods has.

Beckmeyer lends his skills as an imaginative artist with crayons (or at least it gives that child-like impression). His illustrations are deep and textured, resembling the crayon wax that is left behind on the page when a child colors. This effect ensures readers will see the trees as three-dimensional and coarse with bark.

Dear Wild Child: You Carry Your Home Inside You by Wallace J. Nichols and Dr. Wallace Grayce Nichols, illustrated by Drew Beckmeyer, shares the beauty of a home filled with love, and though it may no longer exist in physical form, all of that love and those memories are carried inside that “wild child.” While loss can be extremely devastating, this books illustrates the beauty of memory and love, as well as that beauty in destructive forces.

RATING: Cinquain

***To help those communities impacted by these destructive wildfires, please consider helping After the Fire.***

About the Authors and Illustrator:

Wallace Grayce Nichols is a student of sustainable design, problem solver, and water lover. Her father, Dr. Wallace J. Nichols, is a marine biologist and the author of the bestselling book Blue Mind: The Surprising Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, More Connected, and Better at What You Do. Home is the slow coast of California. Drew Beckmeyer is a fine artist, illustrator, and elementary school teacher. He lives in Northern California.