There is no limit

"Did it ever occur to you that there's no limit to how complicated things can get on account of one thing always leading to another?"

E.B. White. "Quo Vadimus?" The Adelphi Vol. 1 (new series)

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Not long ago a good friend asked me about geography books for children. It's an interesting topic. And I think I can say, at the risk of seeming immodest, that this is  a topic for which I am completely unprepared.

But that doesn't mean I won't try.

First things first: Just what do you mean by "geography"?

It's a tricky question. The problem is, geography is a sort of ... deep discipline. All disciplines (all fields of study) get complicated the more you look at them. History isn't just "when." It's also "who" and "why" and "where," and so much more. It's biology and economics and weather and art and psychology. Biology isn't just living things. It's energy and chemistry and plate tectonics and anthropology. Poetry, dance, painting -- they're math and neuroscience and climatology. And more. Always, always more. The deeper you look, the more interconnected and complicated everything gets.

And no discipline is more interconnected and complicated than geography. Mona Domosh put it rather well: "We are a promiscuous discipline."¹ Geography overlaps with everything. On the physical science side we have biogeography, meteorology, geomorphology. On the social science side we have demographics, historical geography, economic geography. At the nexus of art and science we have graphic visualization and map making.

Which sort of makes it seem like when somebody asks you for a book about geography, you can literally give them anything. Because it's all "geography," when you think about it.

Which isn't helpful.

And it's also not quite true. Because the underlying fundamental focus of geography is space. Or, as the late George Demko put it, "The why of where."² This unifying idea -- that location is crucial in understanding the world around us -- lets us sift through the clutter.

So, let's get back to the original question about geography books for children. As I said before, I like to think of myself as uniquely unqualified to answer this question. But that's all right. Exploration of unfamiliar territory is a geographic tradition. Let's think about this.

If I'm going someplace new, I buy a guidebook. If I'm looking for information on books, I go to the booksellers.

Let's start with the biggest of them all, Amazon.

Amazon sells everything from AA batteries to Ziploc™ bags, but they started with books, and they're still the largest bookseller in the world. And anybody who's ever been to the website knows that keyword choice is critical. I tried several different but similar search terms. Or maybe not so similar. Because the differences in the results were ... interesting:

• "Children's books geography" (All Departments): 22,108 results
• "Children's books geography" (Books): 19,198 results
• Within "Books" there are 37 categories, some highly relevant, some noticeably less so:
1. Children's Geography & Cultures Books (5,848)
2. Human Geography (434)
3. Beginner Readers (379)
4. Geography (1,519)
5. Regional Geography (438)
6. Earth Science for Teens & Young Adults (545)
7. Teen & Young Adult Geography (206)
8. Science & Technology for Teens (707)
9. Rivers (109)
10. Schools & Teaching (2,838)
11. Children's Books (15,326)
12. Science & Math (3,025)
13. Teen & Young Adult (2,575)
14. Arts & Photography (144)
15. Biographies & Memoirs (197)
16. Business & Money (229)
17. Christian Books & Bibles (87)
18. Computers & Technology (694)
19. Cookbooks, Food & Wine (29)
20. Crafts, Hobbies & Home (48)
21. Education & Teaching (3,042)
22. Engineering & Transportation (329)
23. Health, Fitness & Dieting (106)
24. History (1,834)
25. Humor & Entertainment (100)
26. Law (30)
27. Literature & Fiction (258)
28. Medical Books (99)
29. Parenting & Relationships (62)
30. Politics & Social Sciences (1,044)
31. Reference (10,071)
32. Religion & Spirituality (151)
33. Science Fiction & Fantasy (20)
34. Self-Help (26)
35. Sports & Outdoors (134)
36. Test Preparation (89)
37. Travel (946)
• As an alternative, let's try "Geography books for kids" (Books): 1,068 results. Within this general result there are 27 categories:
1. Teen & Young Adult (41)
2. Children's History (81)
3. Children's American Historical Fiction (5)
4. Science & Math (239)
5. Education & Teaching (151)
6. Travel (97)
7. Computers & Technology (15)
8. Arts & Photography (24)
9. Biographies & Memoirs (13)
10. Business & Money (10)
11. Christian Books & Bibles (11)
12. Comics & Graphic Novels (2)
13. Cookbooks, Food & Wine (9)
14. Crafts, Hobbies & Home (15)
15. Engineering & Transportation (24)
16. Health, Fitness & Dieting (10)
17. History (97)
18. Humor & Entertainment (28)
19. Law (1)
20. Literature & Fiction (18)
21. Medical Books (7)
22. Parenting & Relationships (9)
23. Politics & Social Sciences (67)
24. Religion & Spirituality (19)
25. Self-Help (2)
26. Sports & Outdoors (35)
27. Test Preparation (20)

You'll notice that the lists aren't identical. And a look at the books shows that some of these are distinctly weird choices for "geography."

For example, the "Law" category in the second listing (number 19) has exactly one book: "The Everything Wills & Estate Planning Book: Professional advice to safeguard your assests and provide security" by Deborah S Layton. No doubt a delightful a read, but how on earth is this geography? Or for children?

Another example. In the "Teen & Young Adult Geography" category in the first listing (number 7) the first half dozen "most relevant" titles are:

1. "1st Grade Geography: Continents of the World: First Grade Books" by Baby Professor
2. "Maps, the Oceans & Continents : Third Grade Geography Series: 3rd Grade Books" by Baby Professor
3. "Sixth Grade Daily Geography: Simple Geography Lessons: Wonders Of The World for Kids" by Baby Professor
4. "The Five Elements First Grade Geography Series: 1st Grade Books" by Baby Professor
5. "Weather We Like It or Not!: Cool Games to Play on A Cloudy Day: Weather for Kids" by Baby Professor
6. "Discovering the World of Geography, Grades 7 - 8" by Myrl Shireman

These are definitely geography books. But, with the exception of number 6, they are certainly not suitable for teens or young adults.³

I'm not going to try and go through all of these listings. I'm sure you get the point. Amazon has everything. And all too often they mix the diamonds in with the muck and it's up to you to figure out if what you want is there.

A slightly more targeted approach might be to choose a choosier site. Goodreads is, according to their website, "the world’s largest site for readers and book recommendations. Our mission is to help people find and share books they love." Rather than being forced to search yourself, here you can find books that other people actually think are relevant.

The search "Geography for Children" produced eight groupings:

1. Educational Children's Fiction Books (205 books — 104 voters)
2. Read Around the World (89 books — 61 voters)
3. Microhistories For Juveniles – Social Histories of Things, Events and People (51 books — 28 voters)
4. Picture Books On Africa (120 books — 14 voters)
5. Black and African American Contemporary Picture Books (224 books — 13 voters)
6. Northwest Children's Authors (32 books — 12 voters)
7. Picture Books About Traveling (74 books — 2 voters)
8. Picture Books About Maps & Geography (49 books — 1 voter)

These certainly seem like a good place to start -- but again, surprisingly enough, the selections are just a little bit odd. For example, in the first category, "Educational Children's Fiction Books," the first six books are:

1. Punctuation Takes a Vacation by Robin Pulver 
2. Grapes Of Math by Greg Tang 
3. Zero the Hero by Joan Holub 
4. Who Pooped in Central Park?: Scat and Tracks for Kids by Gary D. Robson 
5. Math Curse by Jon Scieszka 
6. Rotten Pumpkin: A Rotten Tale in 15 Voices by David M. Schwartz

It's true, I haven't read any of these, but I'll bet you a nickle that not one is, by any reasonable definition, about geography.

I'm going to stop here for now. There are lots of other booksellers and recommendation sites to check -- Powell's Books, Barnes and Noble, Waterstones (UK), Booknixie, etc. But my results so far are not especially encouraging.

Anybody who is looking for an easy source of suggestions for geography books for children is going to have to do some digging. Which is kind of annoying. But then again, serendipity is a valid way to find good books. Sometimes it's the only way.

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¹ Domosh, Mona. 2014. "Strategic Essentialism and Radical Intra-Disciplinarity." President's Column, July 15, 2014. American Association of Geographers. Online: http://news.aag.org/2014/07/strategic-essentialism-and-radical-intra-disciplinarity/

² Demko, George J., Jerome Agel and Eugene Boe. 1992. Why in the World: Adventures in Geography. New York: Anchor Books.

³ We defined "geography." We didn't define "child." I'm not sure anybody can define "child." But it should be pretty obvious that five year olds and ten year olds and sixteen year olds have different needs, and really can't use the same books. That's probably a topic for another posting.