The First Rule of Climate Club

 

Kids waste tons of food at school without a second thought. 

Parents leave their cars running in the pick-up lane all the time. 

People buy lots of clothes they don't really need. 

Some of her friends who live in the city and are bused to her school don't always feel included. 

And the mayor isn't willing to listen to new ideas for fixing it all. 

Mary Kate and her friends have big plans to bring lasting change to their community and beyond. And now is the time for the young people to lead and the leaders to follow--or get out of the way.

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Recent Reviews

Bearsville Climate Club is an innovative pilot program: Its students will study climate science and develop community-based initiatives to address environmental concerns. Observant young naturalist Mary Kate Murphy applied along with her bat-loving BFF, Lucy Perlman (both are White), but Lucy is now kept home by a mysterious illness. Initially lost by herself, Mary Kate warms to Mr. Lu, the club’s charismatic Chinese American teacher, who pairs her with composting enthusiast Shawn Hill, a Black student who commutes from Hartford to their better-resourced suburban school. As the students explore their priorities—for example, growing hemp, eliminating leaf blowers, addressing disposable fashion, ending meat consumption—they also learn about and discuss racism’s toxic legacy in their towns and families. Mary Kate is chagrined to learn that wealthier, predominantly White communities, including hers, outsource their trash to the incinerator polluting Shawn’s neighborhood. When the longtime mayor makes Shawn’s out-of-district address an excuse to invalidate the club’s application for a community grant, the students take action, which proves an energizing antidote to feeling helpless about the future. Fast-paced and often funny, this stand-alone companion to Dress Coded (2020) has a similar mosaic structure. Podcast transcripts, checklists, school assignments, and short vignettes showcase Firestone’s gift for illustrating how apparently unrelated issues intersect—or collide—while realistically portraying the voices of middle schoolers.

A passionate novel uplifting young activists. - Kirkus Book Reviews

My name is Carrie Firestone and I'm a writer, teacher, and community leader. As a child, I spent a lot of time worrying about things like poverty, environmental destruction, and war. I eventually learned to channel that worry into action through teaching, storytelling, civic engagement, and project-based service work.I live in Connecticut with my husband Michael, my teen daughters, and our pit bull, Roxie. I love connecting with the world through travel, researching little pieces of fascinating history, and finding ways to inspire environmental stewardship and social justice work at the local level. I also love The Office, conga lines, hummingbirds, cold coffee, Iceland, the activist Inez Milholland, and BOOKS!