Wild Child: A Journey Through Nature

Dara McAnulty (author), Barry Falls (ilustrator)

Wild Child: A Journey Through Nature is a beautiful book, illustrated in full colour by Barry Falls, and divided into five sections: looking out of the window, venturing out into the garden, walking in the woods, investigating heathland and wandering on the river bank.

Dara pauses to tell you about each habitat and provides fantastic facts about the native birds, animals and plants you will find there – including wrens, blackbirds, butterflies, tadpoles, bluebells, bees, hen harriers, otters, dandelions, oak trees and many more.

Each section contains a discovery section where you will have a closer look at natural phenomenon such as metamorphoses and migration, learn about categorization in the animal kingdom or become an expert on the collective nouns for birds.

Every chapter finishes with an activity to do when you get home: plant wild flowers, make a bird feeder, try pond dipping, make a journey stick and build a terrarium.

Dara closes the book with his own inspirational advice for young conservationists, making this the perfect guide for an aspiring naturalist.

Dara McAnulty is a naturalist, conservationist and activist from Northern Ireland. He's received many awards for his conservation work, including from BBC Springwatch, The Daily Mirror and Birdwatch magazine. He's written and presented numerous natural history programmes for BBC radio and television, and become an ambassador for the RSPCA, the iWill campaign and the Jane Goodall Institute. Dara is the youngest ever recipient of the RSPB medal for conservation. He is the author of two books for children, both illustrated by Barry Falls, Wild Child and A Wild Child's Book of Birds. He is currently reading Natural Sciences at Cambridge University and in the holidays lives with his family and Rosie the rescue-greyhound at the foot of the Mourne Mountains in County Down.

His first book Diary of a Young Naturalist won the 2020 Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing, and Wild Child was shortlisted for the 2022 Wainwright Prize for Children's Writing on Nature and Conservation. Dara won the Children's Author category of Bookshop.org’s inaugural Indie Champions Awards. He was awarded the British Empire Medal in the 2023 New Year Honours list for services to the environment and people with autism spectrum disorder.

Barry Falls grew up in rural Northern Ireland, where he spent a lot of time drawing pictures and writing stories to go with them. When he got to art college in Belfast, he discovered that he might be able to do such a thing for a living, and was very excited. Since then, he's been working as a commercial illustrator, and picking up multiple awards for the work he does for such clients as The New York Times, American Airlines, The Telegraph, Laurence King Publishing and many more besides. His work has appeared in magazines, books, exhibitions, on textiles and homeware, and in advertising campaigns around the world. His first book, It's Your World Now! was published in 2019.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Macmillan Children's Books; Main Market edition (8 July 2021)
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 64 pages
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 9781529045321
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 25.7 x 1.4 x 30.5 cm