National Book Month, which takes up all of October, is a good time to start up a contest with your friends. You can decide on a list of books to read together or have a competition for reading the most books. The person who wins gets a free dinner supplied (or maybe a great spa day) by those who participate. The more friends you can get to commit and submit to the money pool, the more extravagant the prize can be. Of course you can do it for the shear fun of reading and knowing how much you've done.
If you are going the group reading route you might want to get a special diary just for keeping track of your October reads. You can list the books you want to read in the front and tick them off as you read them. This can be followed by an entry for each book including the title, author, whether you bought or borrowed it from the library and a blurb about the book and how you felt about it. This will be your proof to your friends of what you read and is also a good reminder later on if you decide to do it again.
Look around your community for book events highlighting local or visiting authors. Take some time to show your support by attending these events. Again, you can get all your friends involved. Check your local library or writers groups for details. Literacy groups may also have some plans for the month.
Most likely, if you have kids they will be having some kind of National Book event at school. Encourage and participate with them. If the school is not having an event, maybe have a talk with the teacher to see how one can be started. You can always celebrate National Book Month alone with your child doing book crafts, reading to one another and just talking about books in general. Maybe even encourage them to write their own book. These activities may extend beyond one month of the year which is really what we want isn't it. A life long love of books is healthy, educational and fun.
Happy National Book Month!
Looking for lists of books to add to your reading list this month? Check out the following for reading ideas:
* Author Q & A's.
* Literary Award Reading Lists
* Best Sellers Lists
* Literary Fiction Editor Reviews
M. E. Wood lives in Eastern Ontario, Canada. If you are going to find this eclectic reader and writer anywhere it is probably at her computer. For more information visit her official website.
