Nutcracker Publishing Company is unveiling the cover of its upcoming children's picture book about nuclear power plants.
Nuclear Power: How a Nuclear Power Plant Really Works! by Amelia Frahm, is the first children's picture book that offers a creative, yet realistic look at nuclear power, and is not anti-nuclear.
"
What a joy, to realize that now kids can learn the basic facts about nuclear energy without first being scared witless"….a portion of the recommendation written by renown nuclear expert,
Dr. Theodore Rockwell Amongst her publishing colleagues, bored yawns and bewildered glances were the typical responses author Amelia Frahm encountered when she announced her next children's book was about nuclear power plants. The Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan changed that perception, and now Nutcracker Publishing is rushing to have advance copies of the book available by June 2011.
Nuclear Power: How a Nuclear Power Plant Really Works! is a factual and inventive account of how nuclear power plants work, told from the viewpoint of a chubby lab rat and a pretty blue bird. In an ironic twist that mirrors real life, the rat and bird look for someone to blame for everything they don't understand about nuclear power. For them, it's a cat named Penelope.
Amelia Frahm is better known for advocating cancer awareness than nuclear power. In 2001 she helped pioneer cancer resources for children when she published
Tickles Tabitha's Cancer-tankerous Mommy, and was the first cancer survivor to write and implement a cancer awareness school program for elementary children.
However, the very first school program Frahm created was about nuclear power plants. After graduating from the University of Florida, in 1982 she was hired by a South Texas power company to work at the South Texas Project Nuclear Plant near Bay City, Texas. One of her first assignments was creating a school program about nuclear power.
She admits, "As interesting as nuclear power may be, not all my students could keep from nodding off, and this book is based on that experience. It's the book I wished for then."
Frahm spent summer 2010 test-marketing her manuscript, and a brief nuclear power presentation to elementary students, alongside staff at the Harris Nuclear Plant, in New Hill, North Carolina. This summer, she's invited back, and this time she'll bring along her new book.