Bound To Stay Bound

Other - 12/08/2025 Bryant renders pioneering climate scientist Eunice Newton Foote (1819-1888) as driven by profound curiosity in this appreciative portrayal. During the subject’s childhood in the U.S., "questions sprouted in her mind as quickly as wheat in the fields," and admission to a girls’ school provides a unique opportunity to learn science. Utilizing historical quotations (including from Frederick Douglass), sharply written prose acknowledges the subject’s involvement in the suffrage movement before describing her curiosity about Earth’s warming temperatures and the ingenious experiment she designs that reveals the relationship between those temps and carbon dioxide. Indicating that "because Eunice was curious, she was the very first," plainspoken lines discuss how Foote’s work has nevertheless been ignored in favor of a male scientist’s later research, before ending with a call for climate awareness. Relying heavily on earthy greens, muddy-toned colored pencil and watercolor illustrations use careful outlines in emphasizing Foote at work, elegantly underscoring the way the protagonist’s life has finally been brought into focus. Background characters are largely depicted with pale skin. Ages 4-8. (Jan.) - Copyright 2025

School Library Journal - 01/16/2026 Gr 2–5—While climate change and global warming are discussed and understood by scientists now, when was that connection uncovered? While it is credited to John Tyndall in 1861, Eunice Newton Foote, a true scientific pioneer, was the first person to make that scientific discovery, in 1858. The artwork is gorgeously soft and tinged with yellow and green hues that set this story in the 1800s at a laboratory dedicated to discovering the connection between carbon dioxide and how it traps the sun's heat in our atmosphere. Foote's story begins with her general curiosity and continues all the way to her schooling, marriage, and family life, then to her major scientific discovery. The book acknowledges that there is no complete record or evidence of Tyndall ever reading Foote's work but does speculate that as a woman and an American, Foote and her accomplishments were not widely lauded. The book ends on a hopeful note about climate change and women in science. Among the back matter is a time line, a glossary, and a bibliography. VERDICT An excellent picture book biography that amplifies one of the unsung heroes of science.—Molly Dettmann - Copyright 2026 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.