You Are the Earth: From Dinosaur Breath to Pizza from Dirt

Steve Pitt is a Toronto-based freelance writer and an award-winning journalist. He has written many young adult and children's books, including Day of the Flying Fox: The True Story of World War II Pilot Charley Fox.

Do germs need love? How many years of his or her life does the average
North American spend watching television commercials? Why is the dirt
under your feet the top of the food chain? How many billion creatures
call your body home-sweet-home? What are the chances that you have just
inhaled an air molecule once exhaled by Julius Caesar or even a
tyrannosaurus rex? These are some of the questions answered in this book
written by award-winning scientist David Suzuki and children’s writer
Kathy Vanderlinden. The content is divided into eight chapters. Their
linking theme is how each person is inescapably linked to every other
thing, living or dead, on Earth.

The text is a spicy mixture of hard scientific fact and playful
diversions. Creation stories from all over the world are spliced between
chapters about water conservation, energy sources, and how the Earth’s
atmosphere sustains all life on the planet. A series of suggested
experiments allows readers to put Suzuki’s theories to the test.
Dozens of fascinating photos, goofy cartoons, charts, and illustrations
support the text. Although very entertaining, the book never loses sight
of its serious environmental message. Readers are even advised on how
they can improve the ecology around their neighborhoods and around the
world. Highly recommended.