How the Borks Became

Name: William Joseph
Price range: $

by Jonathan Emmett, illustrated by Elys Dolan

Interest age: 4 to 7
Reading age: 5+

Published by Otter-Barry Books, 2018

Funny
Picture books
Poetry and rhyme

About this book

Evolution can be a difficult concept to explain to children, but this amusing picture book presents it beautifully. The fictional Bork species, inhabitants of Planet Charleebob, are fluffy yellow animals with six legs and long necks, but they haven’t always looked like this. Originally, they were squat creatures with short blue fur.

When some Borklings were born with shaggy fur, they survived a particularly cold winter, while the others died. So, the following breeding season, all Borks were born with shaggy fur. Most were still blue, but a few had bright yellow coats, which camouflaged them against the yellow mossy landscape, helping them evade capture by the Ravenous Snarfle. Therefore, the next brood of baby Borks were born with bright yellow shaggy fur, and so it continued. The species evolved and those who didn’t adapt to the changing environment died out.

Reminiscent of Dr Seuss books, this fantastically funny tale combines humour, rhyming text and wonderfully vibrant illustrations to present evolution and natural selection in an accessible way. The endpapers document the plants and animals found on Planet Charleebob and there is even some factual information about evolution on Earth and the scientist Charles Darwin squeezed in at the end.

About the author

After leaving college Jonathan worked as an architect for several years, before pursuing a full-time career in children’s books.

In addition to writing young fiction and picture books, Jonathan has also written and paper-engineered a number of pop-up books, including Pirate Pussycat and Tyrannosaurus Rocks for Simon & Schuster. Other titles include his hugely popular Mole series: Bringing Down the Moon, A Diamond in the Snow, A Secret Worth Sharing (Walker), and The Princess and the Pig (Macmillan).

Jonathan lives in Nottingham with his wife Rachel, and his two children. His hobbies include walking, reading, furniture design and tinkering with his website.

About the illustrator

Elys Dolan is the author and illustrator of Weasels. Elys grew up in a part of Sussex, England that consists almost entirely of trees and cows and she was named after a department store in Wimbledon, London. She’s never let either of these things hold her back and Elys recently graduated with distinction from the MA in Children’s Book Illustration at the Cambridge School of Art. In recent time, Elys has been awarded second place in the Macmillan Prize and was also shortlisted for the Waterstone’s ‘Picture This’ prize. Elys works predominately with ink, newfangled digital witchcraft and coloured pencils of which she is the proud owner of 178 but can never seem to find a sharpener. Based in Cambridge, when Elys is not drawing she grows cacti, collects pocket watches and spends altogether too much time in the company of other illustrators.

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