Help Readergirlz donate 125,000 great books to low-income teens

Awesome kids' book author and literacy activist Lorie Ann Grover sez, "readergirlz and First Book are partnering to give away more than 125,000 brand-new books to low-income teen readers. We need help getting the word out about the A Novel Gift campaign. Let's get organizations serving these teens registered with First Book so they can be matched with inventory during the holidays. If you participate, drop us a note at readergirlz@gmail.com to be included in our blog roll of thanks to run December 31."

They're great books, too, donated by generous publishers. Among the three dozen choices are P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast's HOUSE OF NIGHT series and Alyson Noël's SHADOWLAND.
We need your help getting the word out about the A Novel Gift campaign. Right now! Right now! As in, now!

rgz and First Book Partner for A Novel Gift! Over 125,000 free books to low-income teens (Thanks, Lorie Ann, via Submitterator!)

Operation Teen Book Drop: getting 10000 books into the hands of ...

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Lorie Ann Grover

Thanks, Cory!
timbearcub

is there a similar scheme like this in the UK?

I always remember as a kid being sent a book as part of a publisher/magazine hookup to send out free books, it was great – and meant I bought that series of books where I could…I can see how for those with no money free books are a lifeline.
Brian Minter

Those are great questions (I work for First Book). First Book has been around for a while, and the model of getting books to kids has been a good one. Everyone is aware of advances in the tech we use for reading, but there are lots of challenges, as you might imagine. Getting books (in whatever form) into the hands of kids who wouldn’t otherwise have them is the goal.

I love paper books too. But I accept that, one day, they *probably* won’t be how we read.

At present, First Book operates in the U.S. and Canada.

(The effort that Readergirlz is making has been really awesome, by the way.)
vmaldia

In my country a touch screen cell phone that can be used to read TXT books and documents can cost like US$70 and an android cell phone can cost US$250. A cheapo chinese knockoff of the 7 inch ipad maybe costs US$110. Wouldnt it be cheaper faster and more efficient in the long run to just get one of these devices for each kid and give them e-books instead of using paper books?
- SonOfSamSeaborn
  
  It’s a good point, but if you obtain a plaintext book it’s probably not technically legal unless you own a hard copy. It’s a shame there isn’t an open, standard ebook format with widespread adoption, and that indeed for every device there is another prop format with more manufacturers announcing devices every month or so.
  
  Also, in the old traditional way, I love paper books and would love to be able to encourage their use. I hope this extends to the UK as well because my God there are some dumb shits with money here.