What authors say..
The library is a magical place, inhabited by a cast of invisible people who conduct their lives off stage, yet when introduced to us can transform our world forever.
The library is the heart of the school, and it is the teacher librarian who brings it to life.
Not all children come naturally to reading, and it is the particular satisfaction of librarians to get to know the child, and channel their reading into new frontiers.
"The characters come alive inside us," says children's author Morris Gleitzman. "Fiction reminds us that the great adventures are inside ourselves."
But it will often take the gentle persistence and inspiration of an adult to introduce that story to the child. The slow deep pleasures of a novel are not instantaneous.They grow with our increasing intimacy with the characters. As a reader imaginatively slips into the shoes of a character, the story becomes, quite naturally, a lesson in empathy.