World Book Night!

Happy World Book Night/ St. George's Day and Happy Birthday to The Bard, Mr. William Shakespeare!

I rarely need an excuse to shamelessly promote reading to as many people as I possibly can. World Book Night is one of those occasions where I take my babbling off the screen, and out on to the streets of Birmingham.

I've been lucky enough to be a giver for the second year running, and this time saw me giving out 20 copies of 'Treasure Island' by Robert Louis Stevenson. (You can find my review for it here.)
Prepping for the evening is the least exciting bit of the process, but I found myself making little gifts out of the books. Which included little skull-and-cross-bones tags* (pictured), and small handwritten notes on the wrapping paper. Not tooting my own horn, but I would have loved to receive one of my own books this evening!

4pm came far too quickly, but I found myself more than ready to spread the word of literature like pixie dust. Conclusion: The people of Birmingham believe in books! We had the most perfect weather, and I'm sure that made people far more agreeable and open to listen to me. I found myself completely out of books in just under two hours! I still had more than enough time to have a nice conversation with a few of the people I spoke with. It was a beautiful thing, and has topped up my faith in the world of first time readers. And in my city of course.

World Book Night posted an interesting request via their social media pages, asking everyone to update their statuses to, "I love reading because..." At first I found it difficult to put into words just why I love reading, and literature generally.
I feel after my giving today, I feel more would say that I love reading because it's concrete evidence that magic exists in the world.

I hope you all enjoyed your World Book Night as much as I did in whichever way you decided to celebrate. I will now conclude off my evening with some light reading, followed by some heavier reading.

Be sure to follow World Book Night on Twitter, for information about their future events and how to apply to be a giver in 2014.

Happy Reading!
- Kaveeta

* The skull tags were made by my incredibly talented crafty friend Emma. She really is brilliant, if you love these tags, I would strongly recommend checking out and liking her Facebook Pages, here and here. You can also follow her on Twitter.

Review: Treasure Island

I was a bit reluctant to pick this up at first, not for any reason in particular, but the feeling was noticeable enough for me to avoid buying it. Part of this reading journey is sticking my nose in a book where it wouldn't usually belong- so when I saw it on sale for a pound I snapped it up straight away. It still took me over six months to actually read it though. 

What I found inside was every child's dream; I was transported back to the times I used to hunt for lost treasure around my house. I was sucked in from the very first page, Billy Bones had me by the scruff of my neck and I loved every single minute of it.

Roughly, here's how it goes: Boy lives in an inn. In walks Pirate. Boy finds treasure map. Adventure ensues. It's a clear coming of age story... and one of treachery. And of deceit. And of cowardice and bravery and definitely a little bit of insanity. Plus, it has the baddest pirates that we've all known to love andfear. (Long John Silver, anyone?) This is what all adventure stories should be made of!
I want to give as little detail as possible because I implore everyone to read this at least once, to read it soon and to be simply giddy with surprise and excitement- because I certainly was.

The only downsides I can think of is that the language is a little tricky sometimes; I'm well-versed in the structure of classic literature but even I had to do the odd re-read. Not that it should put anyone off, it's well worth the effort! Thirty-four chapters of pure adventurous fun! I just wish it didn't end so soon! 

"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest--

...Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum! "

RATING: ★★★★★