The Planet Hunter: The Story Behind What Happened to Pluto
by Elizabeth Rusch
Illustrated by Guy Francis
Rising Moon, 2007
32 pages, $15.95

The Planet Hunter

High-achieving researchers often get their share of the spotlight. They win prestigious prizes, go on national television and radio, have books, and newspaper and magazine articles written about them and their discoveries. But rarely do you see a scientist featured in an illustrated children’s book.

Professor of Planetary Astronomy Mike Brown now has that distinction. He is the hero of The Planet Hunter: The Story Behind What Happened to Pluto (Rising Moon, 2007), a children’s book written by Elizabeth Rusch and illustrated by Guy Francis. Rusch tells the story of Brown’s childhood, his discovery of Eris—briefly known as the 10th Planet—and the subsequent vote that demoted Pluto and made headlines around the world.

A perusal of children’s books about scientists turns up stories about the likes of Albert Einstein, Galileo, and Leonardo da Vinci—subjects who tend to be old and dead. So if you’re like Brown and don’t fit either category, how do you get a children’s book written about you?

In January 2005, Brown discovered an object in the Kuiper Belt, a population of at least 70,000 icy bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. But this object, nicknamed Xena (as in the television series’ Warrior Princess), was bigger and farther away than Pluto. Controversy swirled over whether the shiny sphere, now officially named Eris, was indeed the 10th planet. If it wasn’t a planet, Pluto shouldn’t be either, since both objects are markedly different in size, orbit, and location—among other characteristics—from the other eight planets.

Rusch had been engrossed in the debate since the beginning, she says. In August 2006, the controversy came to a head as the International Astronomical Union convened in Prague to vote on the definition of a planet. Rusch realized the implications of the vote were huge, regardless of the result. Every book, poster, and placemat adorned with the solar system loved by children everywhere would have to be changed. This dramatic revision would have to be explained to kids, says Rausch, who has written for both adults and children. “It wasn’t so much that [Brown] discovered the 10th planet,” she says, “but that our understanding of the solar system was going to change one way or another, and the story behind that had to be told.” She wanted to show that science was about constant discovery involving real people, and not just facts to be memorized from a textbook.

She pitched the idea to her editor, got quick approval, and, just a week after Pluto got the boot, sent Brown an e-mail requesting an interview. Initially unsure about the request—admittedly an odd one for an academic—Brown agreed to talk and help with the book. Swamped with media requests and other distractions from the “crazy Pluto thing,” as he calls it, Brown then forgot about the project. “The funniest part of this, at least to me, is that I have almost no memory of this,” Brown says. “There were so many other things going on, this was just one of a million things that were happening.” In fact, Brown neglected to tell his wife until the book came out in December 2007.

Since the topic was a timely one, the project had to move swiftly. The fact that it took just over a year from pitch to publication is an anomaly, Rusch says. Normally, children’s books can take three years to publish. The editor found an illustrator, Guy Francis, who, as it turned out, illustrated the favorite book of Brown’s two-year-old daughter, Lilah. Everything came together smoothly, as if, well, the eight planets were aligned.

For Rusch and Brown, the final product was a success. According to Brown, “The story is dead accurate,” including such details as his failed childhood attempts at rocketry, illustrations of his childhood dog Roscoe and the green 1964 Volkswagen Beetle he drove in high school, and the discovery of Eris and the demotion of Pluto. He’s not sure how successful it’ll be in bookstores, but “it’s fun to watch the Amazon rankings,” he says. At the time of this writing, it’s number 138,554, and at one point reached the top 25 in the category of science and technology biographies for children, joining Einstein, da Vinci, and others who are old and dead. The Planet Hunter has also been nominated for a 2008 Pacific Northwest Book Association Award.

The fact that Brown has a young daughter helps him understand the book’s audience, he says. Lilah, who appears in the story, loves the book. “She thinks it’s the book about her,” he says.

The last illustration portrays Brown with Lilah a few years older, looking at the night sky with a telescope. “When I was flipping over the proofs, I saw that, and my heart just sort of melted,” he says. “I have a soft spot for the book just for that.” —MW