Bilingual Books for Bookstart

Hands up who loves a story! Especially a bedtime story! Whether you love hearing about princes and princesses, heroes and heroines (and yes, ordinary people are heroes and heroines too), traditional, modern or somewhere in between, did you know there is now academic evidence and research to show what a great idea they are? So we're delighted to announce that two of our new bilingual titles for 2019, "Errol's Garden" and "Quiet", will be featuring on the next Bookstart list.

We think of BookTrust as quite a recent organisation, but it was in fact founded in 1921, by Hugh Walpole. Like so many great ideas, Bookstart itself began as a small pilot project 25 years ago. It all began under the BookTrust umbrella. Not everyone has access to a local library, or feels confident using them. (We know librarians aren't scary shushing kinds of people any more, and many of them never were, but if you've never been inside a library, it can all be a little bit overwhelming. Especially if your first language isn't English.) So the whole ethos of Bookstart is to encourage reading in the home by making books available directly to families. (In 2019, Bookstart Week became Pyjamarama.)

We all know how important community is, and in recent years community gardens and farms have often become a focus for their local areas. They're a great way for everyone, young, old, or in-between (ahem!) to learn how to grow and harvest food, herbs and flowers. Even in the most built-up inner city space, there is usually a little patch of land to be found to start a community garden. We don't think it's going too far to say it's a kind of magic. And Errol's Garden takes you on a magical journey to just one such place...

Meanwhile, we know we love the sound and the shape of words in every language, dialect and variant, but we always try to make time for a little peace and reflection too. So our upcoming 2019 dual language title "Quiet" fits the bill perfectly. 

So look out for Errol’s Garden and Quiet - coming soon. (You can find out more about both in our autumn 2019 catalogue.

References

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