“I am your sun, your golden star. All ocean life depends on me …” As they did in Living Sunlight: How Plants Bring the Earth to Life (Blue Sky Press / Scholastic, 2009), Molly Bang and Penny Chisholm collaborate on another lyrical and informative picture book, this time about the importance of sunlight to the chain of life beneath the sea. Phytoplankton—the microscopic plants that form “the great invisible pasture of the sea”—and other ocean plant life rely on the light of the sun and nutrients to survive. But even in the darkest part of the ocean, far from its reach, the sun still plays an important role. “My light helps drive enormous currents. They thrust the deep sea waters, rich with nutrients and carbon dioxide, up” so the phytoplankton can reproduce. Thumbnails of Molly Bang’s gorgeous stylized illustrations accompany end notes that provide more information on the science of the sea. (Ages 7–11)

Explains how all life on the Earth depends, directly or indirectly, on light from the sun, and describes how all ocean life, from the tiniest plankton to great whales, including the creatures in the darkest depths, form a web that uses sunshine.