Tag: reading

We love our libraries!

Carnegie UK Trust sets out five-point plan to boost public libraries

A report published today provides both cause for concern and reason for hope for the UK’s pressured public library service. Scotland has the highest level of public library use in the UK, according to the new research, with half of the 1,000 Scots surveyed saying they had visited a library within the past year. Continue reading We love our libraries!

:’Happy readers make good learners’: reading challenge extended

A challenge designed to instil a love of reading in young people is being extended to reach an additional 173,000 children across Scotland. The First Minister’s Reading Challenge will now be open to children in Primary 1 to Primary 7, after the success of the initial scheme which was for primaries 4 – 7. Continue reading :’Happy readers make good learners’: reading challenge extended

Inaugural Scottish teenage book prize winner revealed

Borders-based author Claire McFall has been named the winner of the very first Scottish Teenage Book Prize. Claire’s third novel, Black Cairn Point, garnered votes from young people (aged 12 – 16) across the country to beat off stiff competition from Keith Gray’s The Last Soldier and Joan Lennon’s Silver Skin. Continue reading Inaugural Scottish teenage book prize winner revealed

And Edinburgh’s most borrowed book in 2016 was …

Edinburgh’s most borrowed books of 2016 have been published, revealing a penchant for crime and mystery amongst city readers. Psychological thriller The Girl on the Train topped the list of fiction books borrowed from the capital’s libraries last year, followed closely by Ian Rankin’s Even Dogs in the Wild and Peter May’s Coffin Road. Continue reading And Edinburgh’s most borrowed book in 2016 was …

Three free books for Scotland’s P1s

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As part of Book Week Scotland 2016, the national celebration of reading taking place between 21 and 27 November, Scottish Book Trust will gift three free picture books to every Primary 1 child in Scotland.

The books, all by Scottish authors or illustrators, will be gifted in the Bookbug Primary 1 Family Bag and children will receive this year’s shortlisted books for the book Bookbug Picture Book Prize.  The titles include: There’s a Bear on My Chair by Ross Collins, Hare and Tortoise by Alison Murray and Shark in the Park on a Windy Day by Nick Sharratt.

Also included in the Bookbug bag will be an activity booklet full of games and fun things to do, along with a voting slip to enable children to declare which of the three picture books is their favourite.

Marc Lambert, Chief Executive of Scottish Book Trust, said: “The beginning of school is the point at which books start to become associated with learning in a child’s mind. The Bookbug Primary 1 Family Bag has been designed to show children how pleasurable and fun reading can be. The intention is to help them to get more out of school and inspire them to seek out and devour more books.”

For more information about Book Week Scotland 2016, visit www.bookweekscotland.com, where you can find information about all the events taking place in your local area, vote for your favourite Scottish book to screen adaptation, take part in a  #ReadingDare and discover a whole host of resources and ideas to help you celebrate and share whatever it is you love to read. 

Initiated by the Scottish Government and supported, along with a Readers in Residence programme in libraries, by £200,000 from Creative Scotland, Book Week Scotland will be delivered by Scottish Book Trust. Book Week Scotland in libraries is funded byThe Scottish Library and Information Council.