Inspiring Young Readers

posted on 04 Jan 2026

The Flickering Fires by Grahame Baker-Smith

This is the fourth instalment of Grahame Baker-Smith’s stunning series of picture books with the collective title of ‘The Elements’  (Rain, Wind and Earth preceded it).

Baker-Smith tells the story of fire but, more specifically, the relationship between fire and humanity. You might think that this is a dauntingly complex task to take on in a picture book format that runs to no more than 20 pages but he pulls it off with stunning results.

What is perhaps most admirable is the fact that he doesn’t in any way dumb-down or patronise his young audience: what he doesn’t do is pare away the detail and find the narrative thread of history that takes us from the first discovery of fire to the advanced technological society it now enables.

Without fire it’s clear that the evolutionary path humanity would have followed would have been a very different one. But, that being said, there’s still a thorny question to the answered: where do all the materials that we use to exploit the power of fire come from in the first place?

Well, Baker-Smith is up to taking this question on too – and you won’t be surprised to discover that this part of the story has a fiery centre too. We take a trip into deep space to watch a star burning at unbelievable temperatures finally run out of fuel, explode and scatter itself across the universe.

All the elements created by the star – oxygen, magnesium, calcium,iron, gold,silver- all make up the ashes and:

“When mixed with clouds of interstellar gas and dust they form the building blocks of new stars, like our Sun, and planets, like Earth.”

We are all stardust:

“The oxygen you breathe is the dying breath of a star. The calcium in your bones, the iron in your blood, even the magnesium in your DNA. The metals and minerals in the rocks. All made in the heart of a star.”

And all of this wonderful story comes with Baker-Smith’s stunning full and double-page illustrations that are virtually another story in their own right – there is so much detail and so many extra talking points in every drawing.

Very strongly recommended.

Available now in paper/card cover from Templar Books, you will be able to get a copy from your local independent bookshop- who will be happy to order you a copy if they don’t have it on their shelves.

 

Terry Potter

December 2025