Dominic Bean and the Mammoth Melt
Dominic Bean used to be a good kid. But that was before his scientist parents left to work on a secret project in the Canadian Arctic and “dumped” Dom and his sister, Del, on their eccentric aunt and uncle’s smelly New Hampshire farm. Not only is Dom failing seventh grade, he hasn’t heard from his parents in weeks, is taunted by school bus bully Everett Belanger, and tormented by the stubborn sharp-horned Highland cow Harriet he is forced to take care of.
But the farm turns out to be full of surprises. A developer is trying to buy the Bean family land to build a plastic-domed Arctic-themed amusement park, Dom’s nemesis at school, Edith, turns out to have a way with Harriet, and reading his dad’s old journal leads Dom to an ancient and mysterious woolly mammoth tusk that his father and uncle once found in the farm’s bottomless bog. And when Dom learns that his jam-making aunt and whiskey-distilling uncle are in fact in cahoots with his parents on a top-secret project in the farm’s old milking parlor— he finds himself knee-deep in his family’s secret mission to keep the Arctic permafrost from melting and save the world from climate disaster.
With humor and a storyline laced with cutting-edge climate science, this Charlotte’s Web meets Ice Age mystery-adventure introduces young readers to the peril of our melting Arctic permafrost, the people trying to keep it from melting, and the notion that solutions, no matter how small, are born of the failures that precede them.
Age range: 9 to 12
Grade range: 4 to 7
Cool information about permafrost, the fast-changing Arctic ecosystem, climate science, and scientists:
What is Permafrost? NASA Climate Kids
Rewilding the Arctic and Permafrost Thaw
George Church and the Woolly Mammoth Project
Sergey and Nikita Zimov's Pleistocene Park
The Mount Holly Mammoth, History Since Discovery by Brennan Gauthier and Matthew Boulanger
Dominic Bean and the Mammoth Melt Reviews
“A Boston seventh grader who’s been suspended from school stumbles into a secret experiment in ecological rescue going on right under his nose in this headlong STEM-centric mystery.
Spinning her tale around a bold scientific theory, Burack pitches 12-year-old Dominic Bean into a dizzying round of revelations—not least being his discovery of an advanced genetics lab hidden on the New Hampshire farm of his supposedly low-tech, back-to-the-land aunt and uncle. Feeling abandoned by his scientist parents, who have gone off to Nunavut on an expedition “to keep 1.5 trillion metric tons of permafrost-trapped carbon from being released into the atmosphere and destroying the world,” Dom is struggling with anger issues serious enough to get him kicked out of school. But he’s a smart kid, and as the author cranks up the pacing, he rises to an entire series of challenges ranging from saving his tanking grades to saving his little sister when she gets caught in a deadly bog. He even helps to rescue a certain shaggy, scene-stealing prehistoric wonder baby (see title) from a set of greedy grown-ups. The cast...includes a significant supporting child character who is deaf in one ear and uses a hearing aid.
Climate activism fuels a fizzy mix of amazing discoveries and thrilling escapes. (map, author’s note, further reading, glossary) (Mystery. 9-13)”
“An imaginative adventure with a very relatable hero, a cast of quirky characters (both human and animal!), and a bedrock of fascinating science that’s perfect for curious kids – plus the world’s cutest baby woolly mammoth!”
“Full of astonishing science and lovable characters, Dominic Bean and the Mammoth Melt is a deeply humorous, heart-centered, and hopeful story of the power of community action to change lives—and our world.”
“This adventure connects themes of science, family, imagination, and discovery. The science is accessible for middle grade readers and is perfect for kids who love real-world issues with some wonder mixed in, all while solving big problems.”