World Book Night

14 years ago

Hello everyone, I got an email from an RPer who is having trouble signing in and so I'm posting it. Has anyone heard ot this? Doesn't this sound like a great idea? I'm going to give it a go. From the website -

Welcome to World Book Night

We need book-loving volunteers to fan out across America on April 23, 2012! Just take 20 free copies of a book to a location in your community, and you just might change someone's life. Please sign up by Feb. 1.

The goal is to give books to new readers, to encourage reading, to share your passion for a great book. The entire publishing, bookstore, library, author, printing, and paper community is behind this effort with donated services and time.

The first World Book Night was held in the UK last year, and it was such a big success that it's spreading around the world! Please volunteer to be a book giver in the U.S. Sign up now to be a book giver.

Here is a link that might be useful: World Book Night

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Comments (10)

J C
Original Author
14 years ago
And down -
veer
14 years ago
Quite a lot of interest was shown in this over here last year. Have had a look around google and not much about it yet, or in the papers either; but the actual date isn't until April.
I did find a list of the books . . . see below. Are they the same as the US titles?

Siobhan, I'll post again when there is more info available.

Here is a link that might be useful: Chosen books
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dedtired
14 years ago
My neighbor works for a book publishing company and sent this to me (among others). I'd love to do it but honestly don't who I would give the books to. Has to be someone(s) who is not currently a reader. I'll think about it some more. I'd love to participate.
carolyn_ky
14 years ago
The article was in our paper this morning. Collection points are the public library and a local independent bookstore.

Dedtired, I was thinking the same thing--who would you give them to?
vickitg
14 years ago
Vee -- It looks like it's different books in the US. Visit the link Siobhan posted and click on "The Books" at the top to see the list. There's maybe a few books that overlap, but mostly it's different books.

I'd love to do this, but I live out in the middle of nowhere now.
dedtired
14 years ago
It sounds like you are supposed to hand them out in a place that would encourage people to become readers. Everyone around me is a reader -- or at least educated and would be insulted if I handed them a book! I'd be glad to send mine to an organization that might want them, but that doesn't sound like what you are expected to do.
veer
14 years ago
I seem to remember that in the original book night people just left books lying around on park benches, phone boxes etc for others to pick up and read.
I can't see how it would work in an area such as this, where I live. Unlike dedtired's neck of the woods, few folk do much reading here, mostly the odd romance and those magazines full of photos of celebs and the latest scandals.
Nor do I know if our library would respond to 'hosting' a scheme where books are brought in to be collected by others.
As it is they no longer accept any books 'donated' to their collection. Too much 'trouble' for the staff?
lemonhead101
14 years ago
From what I have read, the books have been distributed to women's shelters, Boys and Girls' Clubs (if it's a kid-friendly book), prisons, fire stations, police stations, homeless shelters etc...

I might sign up and hand it around to some of the non-profits I know around town... I think that would work. We have a big central office called the Volunteer Center and they are very good at hooking you up with charities who need help.

Just my two cents.
liz
dedtired
14 years ago
OT, but Veer, I am on the board of my library and also volunteer once a week. Donated books, etc., really can be a problem. Our libraries are understaffed and it's all they can do to keep up with the day to day work, much less process donations. First they have to check to see if the book is needed or appropriate for the collection. If so it has to be assigned a Dewey decimal number, added to the online catalog and get barcoded as well as getting a plastic book jacket. It really is more work than it sounds like!

We do put some books out for sale but Book Sale space is very limited, plus people paw through them and leave a mess.

A pox on the people who dump boxes of old useless books on the doorsteps of libraries when they are closed. One time we had such a pile that we could not open the door. Old, moldy textbooks that were years old. What were they thinking??

Anyway, sorry to go OT. I am trying hard to think of how I could distribute books. It sounds like you get 20 copies of the same book. I must be missing something here.
J C
Original Author
14 years ago
Wow, lots of interest here, that's good! I was thinking of a combination of handing them out at the library - with permission of course - and since I work at a hospital, that's a given. Even with the small population here, I figure I can give out twenty books, maybe not all in one night. I am running into trouble with the deadline, though, not sure I can talk with the library director before February 1.