PICTURE BOOK - One Plastic Bag: Isatou Ceesay and the Women of the Gambia by Miranda Paul

Illustrated by Elizabeth Zunon

2015, Millbrook Press, Minneapolis

32 pgs.

Goodreads rating: 4.29 - 769 ratings

My rating:  5

Endpapers:  collage of flattened plastic bags

Setting:  Contemporary Njau, Gambia

1^st line/s:  "Isatou walks with her chin frozen."

My comments:  Oooo-eeeee, this is my kind of book!  Ite tells how one woman in Gambia, after realizing that stinky, fly-attracting piles of plastic bags were making her village unsightly and unhealthy, came up with a plan to reuse/recycle them.  In the long run, the women of the town have started one heck of a business enterprise!  Illustrations are collaged and are lovely, as is the story.  My last class at THA recycled plastic bags into PLARN and we made a sleeping mat for the homeless shelter.  It took a lot of hard work and almost a full year, but boy were the kids proud!  This is a great introduction to teaching about recycling plastic gabs AND introducing some really cool DIY activities.

Goodreads:  Plastic bags are cheap and easy to use. But what happens when a bag breaks or is no longer needed? In Njau, Gambia, people simply dropped the bags and went on their way. One plastic bag became two. Then ten. Then a hundred.
          The bags accumulated in ugly heaps alongside roads. Water pooled in them, bringing mosquitoes and disease. Some bags were burned, leaving behind a terrible smell. Some were buried, but they strangled gardens. They killed livestock that tried to eat them. Something had to change.
          Isatou Ceesay was that change. She found a way to recycle the bags and transform her community. This inspirational true story shows how one person's actions really can make a difference in our world.