Home

Narelle Oliver (author/illustrator)

Omnibus Books, Australia: 2006

ISBN: 1862916683

Genres: biology, factual text, information text, non-fiction, picture book, science

Issues: ecology, environment, ethics

Shortlisted for Qld Premier's Literary Awards, 2006.
Shortlisted for CBCA Picture Book of the Year, 2007.

Habitat destruction is something that should concern all those who respect living things or an in any way sensitive to their environment. Narelle Oliver has captured this concern beautifully in Home, the story of a pair of peregrine falcons that is driven into the city when their bush home is destroyed by fire.

Their new ‘cliff home' is in fact a small ledge in a high rise office block. The male must hunt through the noise and movement of city traffic, confused by the unpredictable creatures in this new habitat - cars, boats, hot air balloons, children on play equipment. His normal pretty of small birds are hard to find. Instead he hunts a seagull over the harbour. As his mate has laid eggs, it is vital that he adapts very quickly to this environment if they are to survive.

Illustrated in a fascinating, highly effective combination of elements including collage, linocut rubbings, photography, pastel, pencil and watercolour, Oliver's images take the reader well beyond the text. Her sensitive projection of the confusing welter of images faced by creatures in the city manages to capture the visual ‘noise' to which they must adapt. The text is comparatively simple and encourages detailed examination and discussion of the images to clarify and enrich meaning.

Based on the lives of Frodo and Frieda, two peregrine falcons nesting on top of a twenty-seven storey inner city riverfront skyscraper in Brisbane, Queensland, Home examines the consequences for just one species of the changes that humans are constantly making to their environment.

Highly recommended.