I’m working on my next book in the Caitlyn Jamison Mystery Series. For this series, I use current social, economic, or environmental issues as one of the plotlines. When I decided on one that I am especially passionate about, I realized that three of the five books have an environmental issue as part of the storyline. I wonder: do we ever learn anything about protecting our environment? Contemplating how to proceed, a book published in 1970 came to mind. I’ve posted this on Facebook and LinkedIn, hoping that people will think about what we are doing to our planet. As I read about the environmental protection laws that are being overturned, [“EPA eliminates rule limiting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.” NPR, September 15, 2026], and this is only one of many laws that have been overturned, I thought about a book I read to my children in the early 1980s, The Wump World by Bill Peet. The book made a big impression on me then, and today it is even more relevant. So relevant that I had to reserve it from a local library and read it again. The book starts with: “The Wump World was mostly grassy meadows and clumps of leafy green trees with a few winding rivers and lakes.” Then the Pollutians from the plant Pollutus arrived in large, loud, metal airplanes. They brought giant machines that started “gobbling up trees and grinding them to bits.” Soon, the land was covered with concrete, and large buildings and factories were built. The air became so polluted that even the Pollutians couldn’t breathe. The Pollutians went to their chief, ironically dressed in an orange robe with a tall orange and yellow hat, to complain about the polluted air. Having destroyed The Wump World, the Pollutians left The Wump World to live and destroy another planet. The population on Earth does not have the option of another planet. It is up to all of us to take care of our own. Climate change is not a hoax. The environmental protections have to be reinstated, and the United States needs to partner with other countries so Earth doesn’t become another planet of Pollutians.

I hope Bill Peet’s children don’t mind if I illustrate this plea for environmental sanity with two photos from his book.