World Book Night

[Calliope]

Hey, US Bookworms!

World Book Night (http://www.us.worldbooknight.org/) is a really fun annual event that encourages literacy and reading for pleasure - and I encourage you to join in! It's easy to sign up - you fill out a short application stating why you'd like to take part and pick your top three books you'd like to give out from the 2014 selection (http://www.us.worldbooknight.org/books/2014). Applicants are notified of the decision in February, you pick up 20 copies of your book early April, and then April 23 you get to go give brand new books to people in an attempt to encourage them to read. I know enough of you are regular readers to enjoy taking part - so sign up today!

[fire_of_avalon]

I'd said this in another thread, but my BFF was getting off work one night when a random stranger drove up to her and handed her a book, The Poisonwood Bible. She read it, loved it, made me read it and it became one of my favorite books! It also spurred me into doing a lot more research into the history of central Africa and filled me with righteous indignant fury! Which will lead me to conquer the world someday. All because of World Book Night.

I am going to do something I never do and subscribe to this thread! So I can monitor you guys and remind myself to see if I will be able to do this!

[noxious.sunshine]

omg I loved the Poisonwood Bible! Soooo goood.

[Shorty]

This is an amazing idea and I have never heard of it for. I will consider some books and sign up!

Thanks for sharing this! This is an amazing idea and I'm so glad there are publishers and companies willing to engage with it.

[Denmark]

this thread has a disappointing lack of encyclopedias (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Book_Encyclopedia).

[Miriel]

I love this whole concept!

I already know which book I'd want to give out if they picked me. Code Name Verity was one of my favorite reads this past year.

[Calliope]

I'm glad you guys saw this, I've been all "Why doesn't anyone else agree this is a really amazing idea :crying2:?" since my first post!

I'm not sure what kind of responses they want, but the website says they accept 95% of applicants, and the responses are limited to 100 words, so I'm pretty sure they'll accept any articulate answers that seem to support the cause.

This year my coworkers gave books away in a bar. In my application for next year, I said I wanted to give them to people at the bus station, local employment agency, or maybe the food bank - targeting people who may not have the money to buy new books, be hesitant to use a public library, and may have simply not allowed themselves to read for leisure for one reason or another. Fingers crossed!

[Jinx]

I would love to do this, but I don't think I'm really out in the public enough to participate.

[Calliope]

I found out today I'm going to be giving out copies of Tobias Wolff's memoir, This Boy's Life :D