National Geographic Releases Series of Children's Books

For over 130 years, National Geographic has been bringing the wonders of the natural world to the comfort of reader’s homes. Not only are the famous magazines filled with interesting information about our planet, but they also feature stunning photography. For the first time ever, National Geographic is diving into the world of children’s books in an effort to encourage a passion for nature and reading in young ones.

As USA Today reports, on September 4, the first fictional children’s book will be released and is the first installment in a seven part series called Explorer Academy. The first book, Nebula Secret, will be released in the US, UK, China, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Romania, Taiwan and Turkey, with the following books being published every six months.

Vice president for content in the Kids and Family division at National Geographic, Jennifer Emmett, said: “Fiction is a first for us. We want to use whatever attracts kids to connect them to the real world based on real science, real society, real culture. We want to engage them with characters so they become even more interested in the science that National Geographic sponsors.”

National Geographic has set the bar very high, and is hoping the series can be akin to the Harry Potter series. “Harry Potter is an enormously high bar, but some of what we are doing is modeled after that,” Emmett explained. “Kid were dying to grow up to be wizards, which they really couldn’t do. But they can grow up to be explorers. We like that pathway.”

The books will follow a 12-year-old boy named Cruz Coronado from Hawaii who joins the Explorer Academy in Washington D.C. He’s not alone, and is joined by a micro-robot of a honeybee named Mel, who is inspired by real life technological innovations.

The children’s series will no doubt increase National Geographic’s already sizeable reader base. The organisation publishes two magazines and 1,200 books a year in three dozen languages, attracts 2 million visitors a month to its website, and recently began a YouTube series.

“We have a wide reach with 285 million kids a month,” Emmett said. “We are cranking out a lot of content. We encourage kids to take on the mindset of explorers…and learn all about the world and make it a better place.”