Calum Marsh on Eleanor Catton’s novel The Luminaries

Even at 800 pages, the book lends itself to speedy reading, the literary fiction equivalent of the streaming-service binge-watch.

A school librarian friend of mine likes to discuss “the power of one” with her young charges — she tells them that, regardless of age, size, colour, creed or gender, each one of us can make a difference in the world. Focusing on two books seems like a good way to round out the year.

Our House is On Fire Jeanette Winter Beach Lane Books Ages four to seven

Subtitled Greta Thunberg’s Call to Save the Planet, this straightforward picture book presents the bare-bones story of a 15-yearold Swedish girl who — alarmed when she learned in school about climate change and the toll it is taking on our planet — first grew depressed and then decided to do something about it. Last year, she launched a one-person school strike for the climate cause, parking herself outside Stockholm’s Parliament Building with a hand-painted sign (“Skolstrejk för Klimatet”) every Friday. At first no one paid attention, but soon people started taking note — “and other school strikers joined in.” As most of us know by now, Thunberg’s one-person stand grew into a global movement and, at the age of 16, she was invited to speak at the United Nations climate talks in Poland and at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

She has not minced words, telling adults they should be ashamed to leave the problem in the hands of children and challenging them to do something to ensure those children will have a future.

Not everyone is a fan of Thunberg’s, but she’s definitely making a difference. Earlier this month, Time magazine named her Person of the Year.

If I Go Missing Brianna Jonnie with Nahanni Shingoose Illustrated by Nshannacappo James Lorimer & Co. Ltd. Ages 10 and older

This book, like the one about Thunberg, centres on a young girl who decided to do something. Brianna Jonnie was 14 when she wrote a letter to Winnipeg ’s chief of police — a letter that forms the basis of this book, written by Jonnie, now 17, with the help of her auntie, Nahanni Shingoose, a member of Roseau River First Nation in Manitoba. Illustrated by Neal Shannacappo, a graphic novelist from Rolling River First Nation in Manitoba, it opens with a quote from the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and an image of a young girl, at a desk, writing a letter to the chief of police.

“I am an Indigenous girl. These are my sisters,” the text begins, over a two-page spread in limited colour (mostly black and white, grey and a bit of red) that shows a group of young Indigenous women, drums in hand, voices raised. The text continues with a description of the author — daughter of “a young, single mom who loves me more than humanly possible” and a father who “is an addict and a criminal,” and with whom she has no contact.

The girl is 14, is not involved with drugs, underage drinking, prostitution or other illegal activities. “I am not a runaway,” she adds, knowing that as an Indigenous female she is more likely to go missing than her peers — and less likely to be found quickly. She encloses a photo that can be used to identify her, should she ever disappear.

“If I go missing, I beg of you, do not treat me as the Indigenous person I am proud to be.

/ If I go missing and my body is found, please tell my mom you are sorry. / Tell her I asked to be buried in my red dress, for I will have become just another native statistic.”

It’s a powerful text — one that should be read, and discussed, in every social studies classroom. The book includes information about the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls launched in Canada in 2016, as well as the complete text of the letter Jonnie sent to the chief of police in Winnipeg that year. It’s a letter that went viral and prompted its author to join a youth empowerment group. “She continues to walk a path of courage,” we’re told in the author’s bio; this year she was one of two young people in Winnipeg to receive the TD Scholarship for Community Leadership.