Jacqueline Briggs Martin

Stories that are part of our lives

The Chiru of High Tibet

By Jacqueline Briggs Martin

The Chiru of High Tibet
  • Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
  • ISBN: 9780618581306
  • Published: September 27, 2010
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Illustrated by Linda S. Wingerter
Houghton Mifflin, 2010
Find @ Your Public Library

About the Book

From the publisher:
The true gripping story of how scientist George Schaller and four mountain men set out to save the chiru (Tibetan Antelope who cannot survive captivity and who live on the high plains of Tibet) from near extinction.

Awards

  • Kirkus Book Reviews – Best of Children’s 2010 Nonfiction
  • Nominated – Maryland Black-Eyed Susan Award — (Picture Book Category) 2012-2013
  • Selected as a Junior Literary Guild selection for January 2011 – Level NE (grades 2-6)
  • The National Science Teachers Association — Children’s Book Council’s Outstanding Science Committee has named the book to the “Outstanding Science Trade Books for Students K-12” list for 2011.

Curriculum

Information about the Illustrator: Linda Wingerter

  • Interior illustrations featured on Wingerter’s Secret Chiru blog
  • The Chiru of High Tibet – mentioned in an interview with Wingerter on the “Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast” Blog
  • Interview with the illustrator, “The Light Within” by Katherine Pierpont, published in Teaching K-8 (March, 2007, Vol.37, No.6); online.
  • Illustrator’s Website and Blog

Reviews

– Starred Review –
In free verse as beautiful as the landscape she describes, Martin tells the ecological plight of the chiru, the tiny antelope-like creatures of the northern plains of Tibet…Wingerter’s lush watercolor landscapes, infused with the pinks and blues of the Tibetan sky and occasionally embellished by mandala-like frames, allow the reader to slow down and savor this gentle tale.
— Kirkus Reviews 

It’s rare for a children’s book to both shock and inspire, but Jacqueline Briggs Martin, author of the Caldecott Medal winner Snowflake Bentley, achieves both in her latest undertaking, The Chiru of High Tibet.
— Angela Leeper, Complete Review on The BookPage

This book is another example of why I love reading children’s books.
— Wini Ashooh, Complete Review at Library Point.

This graceful picture book lets children experience the secret world of a rare wild species hidden away deep in the remotest reaches of Tibet. Wide, sweeping landscapes and the simplest story telling convey the patience and the scientists and explorers who sought the secrets of the chiru.
— Mary Taft, Prairie Lights Books, Iowa City, IA

With an urgent conservation message, this picture book about a threatened species is also a true adventure that will hold readers with its action and facts about science. In spare, free verse, Martin describes the chiru, [and] …. The threat to the amazing species. Grades 1-3.
— Booklist

This book takes a potentially horrifying topic and turns it into a heroic adventure tale. grades 1-3.
— School Library Journal

Doing something noble, protecting our natural resources, placing your values and your purpose on something larger than yourself that leaves the material world in the dust and the true wonder of this achievement all glow in this intriguing true adventure story.  Beautiful lilting narrative and gentle inviting illustrations make this a real gem.  … Ages 5-11.
— ABookandAHug.com

This is the dramatic, true, vividly and poetically told story of the incredibly difficult journey to discover the calving place, and then the effort to have the Chinese government protect it. Sidebars add further information. Double-page scenes are like spacious dioramas, with acrylic paints creating impressive mountain ranges and vast flatlands; each bathed in blues or violets, or amid snow-streaked yellow calving grounds. A decorative frontispiece in Tibetan style, a mystical concluding illustration, and decorative borders all suggest Tibetan art.
— Children’s Literature