Grasshopper New Media Presents...

Editor’s note: Happy Children’s Book Week! Canada celebrates this week, and the US last week!

My 12 year old has recently discovered the “Red Wall” series of books by Brian Jacques. As luck would have it, Mr. Jacques just completed another book in the series and is on a book tour, and we got a chance to see him do a reading and sign books at our local Borders Book Store this afternoon. (We even got him to sign a copy of one of the Redwall books James had out from the school library, making it a rare time when the book you return is worth so much more than the book you took out.)

I’ve become an author reading & signing junkie when it comes to kid’s books. The authors have a way of bringing their books to life for kids, and for the kids, seeing an author “up close” forges a connection between people and books unlike any other. The first children’s author I think I brought the kids to see was Eoin Colfer, who wrote the Artemis Fowl books among others. His tales about basing the goblins on his brothers had every kid in the audience giggling, and the fact he signed my son’s cast made having a broken wrist a little less painful.

Brian Jacques was wonderfully entertaining. He spoke about creating pictures with words, and originally writing his stories for children at a school for the blind in Liverpool, England. He created pictures in all of our minds of the world he created, as well as inspiring all of us who heard him to try something a bit new. He inspired the younger readers to keep reading, and even us parents to take time to travel to new places in our imagination.

If you get a chance, take your children to meet authors. Get books signed, even if you only intend to use then as presents or keepsakes. Your kids will understand and hear an author’s perspective, and this will change their relationship with books forever for the better.

Thank you so much, Brian Jacques, for one of the best Sunday Afternoons I have had in a long time, and for fanning the fire of books, stories and literature in my children. That is a priceless gift every child deserves.

by Whitney Hoffman

[tags]kids, children, parents, parenting, books, book signings, authors, Brian Jacques, Red Wall, Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl, reading, literacy, education, caring, learning, fun[/tags]
Photo graciously provided by mad paul, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved