Friday, 15 June 2012

Happy Birthday Bookstart!

It's the 20th anniversary of Bookstart, the first book-gifting programme in the world, which was launched in 1992. Part of Booktrust, it offers free books to all children during their first year and between the ages of 3-4, usually via health visitors and nurseries. They also run the Bookstart Bear Club online and in libraries (including the one where I work) to encourage young children to read. To help secure future funding, they're asking people to pledge to share 20 books in 2012. Many celebrities are taking part and if you want to join in, you can view the pledge wall and make your own pledge here.

As it says on the Book trust site, there's many ways you can share books - reading them to your own kids (or in my case, The Hound, although he does tend to doze off…), recommending books to friends in person or on line, joining a reading group, taking part in book swaps or posting reviews online. As a writer, encouraging reading (and more importantly a love of reading) is something that's very close to my heart, so I've made my pledge, and I'm going to share my books via this blog throughout the rest of this year. They won't all be books for young children but they will be children's or YA.

So here are my first three books! (I'm cheating slightly, as they're a trilogy, but they're some of my favourite books EVER so I just have to include them.)
  1. Northern Lights by Philip Pullman
  2. The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman
  3. The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman
So, why the His Dark Materials triology? Because every time I re-read them, I get something new out of them. They're exciting, beautifully written, intelligent and thought-provoking, and I can highly recommend them!

In other news…
The copyedits for ACID are done! Woo-hoo! That means I'll be returning to my WIP, which I'm having lots of fun with despite its messy first-draft-ness. And happy book birthday to my dad, whose book Insect Photography - Art & Techniques came out on Wednesday (you can read a bit more about it in last week's post here). Hurrah!

19 comments:

  1. Great blog Em, I will join the pledge, fantastic service and such fun to participate in! Also woooooooooooooop for the copyedits, I am looking forward to this launch so very much!!!

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  2. Well done for getting those copyedits done and good luck with that WIP. I am also at the messy first draft stage and have a lot of sorting out to do! Oh, and congrats to your dad.

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    1. Thanks, Dan. It's a bit nerve-wracking first-drafting again when I've spent so long editing ACID – I want the new book to be at that stage too! But it'll get there in the end. Good luck with yours!

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  3. Congrats on the copyedits being done -- WOOHOO!! (And here's to returning to first drafts, me too!) Bookstart sounds like an absolutely wonderful programme. And I can't wait to read about your dad's book, sounds fascinating.

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    1. Thank you, Julia! Bookstart is great - long may it continue!

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  4. Bravo on the copyedits completion Em. You deserve cheesecake and wine in humungous proportions x

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    1. Thank you, Abi! I have no cheescake (sob) but I have chocolate and wine, so all is well. :D

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  5. Hear hear, the good folks of Booktrust deserve all the praise in the world. I sincerely hope that they manage to get the Booktrust teenage prize going again one day...

    Congrats on the copyedits too. And remember: first drafts are fuuunnn!!! ;-)

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    1. Thank you, Joe! I will try to remember that… honest…

      And yes, hurrah for Bookstart! I hope they get the Teenage prize up and running again one day too, it was awesome.

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  6. Yes indeed, happy birthday Bookstart - and a very special happy book-birthday to your clever Dad.
    Wonderful news that you have reached the finishing line with your copy-edits: HOORAY! XX

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    1. Thank you, Clara! Hooray indeed! *Does a happy dance* xx

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  7. YAY Emma for finishing copy edits. I love HDM too. I wrote my final undergraduate thesis on the books and how Marisa Coulter, Lyra, etc. were feminists, used gender roles and their sexuality to get what they wanted, and sexual awakenings/loss of innocence. (I promise I explained it better to people but its been a few months since then).
    New with me? I just finished my 2nd round of revisions and got my wordcount up to 54,000 words =D (Originally queried at 46,000 - so much improvement)
    Best!

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    1. Thank you, Rachel! That's SO cool that you did your thesis on HDM - it sounds absolutely fascinating. And yay to YOU for nailing those revisions - well done!! Are you resubmitting now? I'll keep everything crossed for you!

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    2. Not resubmitting yet....One of those "I'm close I can feel it but the novel still needs a bunch of work".

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  8. What a fantastic idea and happy (slightly belated) birthday to Bookstart!

    I love the His Dark Material trilogy - a fab first three books.

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    1. Thanks, Jesse! They really are fab, aren't they? I just had to make them my first three!

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  9. I love those books so much! Cried so hard at the end of the Amber Spyglass! Ah, you make me want to go read them all over again...

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    1. I had a sniffle over that too (and I NEVER cry over books). Go! Go read them! :)

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