Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day – December 5th

For the second year on My Novel Opinion and the third year with my children, I am so happy to be able to support and spread the word about one of my favorite Days in the year — Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day, which is celebrated on the first Saturday in December, is now in its sixth year. Today, I have a guest post from Jenny Milchman who once dreamed of connecting children with books, and floated the idea of a special Day around the internet and bookish contacts with huge success. And for this sixth year, Jenny has taken the idea one step further, read on to find out more.

Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day—Part VI!
by Jenny Milchman

Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day began back in 2010 when I had two preschool aged children whom I was taking to story hour at our local bookstore almost every week. I got both a latte and to watch their faces as someone else besides Mommy brought a story to life. What fun. In our increasingly frenetic and—ironically—disconnected world, I wondered, did all children know the joy of time spent in a bookstore?

Inspired by Days such as Take Your Daughter to Work, I floated the idea for a special holiday linking kids and bookstores. Bloggers and listserv members took to the web and before I knew it, 80 bookstores were celebrating just two weeks later on the first Saturday of December. Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day coincided with holiday gift giving, encouraging booksellers to host story hours, author events, craft and cooking demonstrations, and even magic shows designed to give kids a special activity while their parents shopped and browsed. Local businesses gained increased support and families had a wonderful time.

That summer, my husband and I packed our kids into the car and drove cross country, visiting bookstores with Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day bookmarks and posters. We saw the United States one bookstore at a time. The trip offered us a window into different regions of this great land, while driving home the reality of how we are connected. Books connect us in a deeper way than texts or followers do. A smile is not the same as an emoticon, and the virtual world is not a replacement for the face-to-face. We met real friends, different from Facebook friends, in bookstores on the road.

By the following year, Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day had grown to nearly 300 bookstores.

And today TYCBD is celebrated by over 800 bookstores, including one national chain, on five continents. The celebrations are more lavish than ever—as unique as each bookstore in which they are held. Open Book in Wadena, MN, for example, is inviting a story-loving Great Pyrenees in so that the children can read to her!

In one of the early years of celebrating, something occurred to me, and now a long seeded dream is finally about to come true. You see, Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day is about introducing children to the pleasures of time spent in a bookstore, helping them become supporters of their local economies at an early age, and cultivating a lifetime love of reading. But not all children are able to experience these joys–with one in five kids in the United States “food insecure,” owning a book can be an unheard of luxury. I wanted to make TYCBD a Day in which every child could take part.

Now, through the help of generous donors, the expertise of fellow author and grant writer Dan Barrett, and elementary school teacher and writer Heidi Sprouse who took to the streets to drum up support, a rural community in New York State will be able to send two pre-K classes to their town’s local bookstore. Each child will get to purchase a book of their own–in some cases, the first the child has ever owned–take part in a kiddie writers’ workshop, and discuss the excitement of the Day over pizza with classmates and teachers afterwards. This special adjunct Day to TYCBD will benefit not only the children, but also be a boon to two local businesses, including the only independent bookstore in the area, Mysteries on Main Street, which has weathered upheaval and economic downturns to remain a hub of community connection and reading for 24 years! If this pilot Day is successful, we hope that such programs can be instituted in at-risk towns and cities nationwide.

On December 5^th, take your children, a child in your life, or even the child inside yourself to the nearest bookstore. I promise you will find a gift that keeps on giving long after the last page is turned.

To find out more, please go to: http://www.takeyourchildtoabookstore.org/

Jenny Milchman is the author of three novels of psychological suspense published by Ballantine, and the founder of Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day.

Thanks Jenny, and I wish you much success with taking TYCBD to the next level with your pilot scheme.

I hope that everyone reading is able to join me in promoting Take Your Child to a Bookstore online and in your local area.