It was a very adult literary festival in Beijing where attendees listened to authors while sipping single-malt Scotch and cigarette smoking wasn’t prohibited. So it came as a distinct surprise when in a discussion of Orientalism versus reality in contemporary fiction, the subject shifted to children’s literature.

Born in 1965, author Liu Hong’s childhood took place during the Cultural Revolution. As a teenager, after the death of Mao, she began to study English. The first book she read in English was Snow White, which she thought was beautiful, with its colored pictures printed on heavy paper; it was, she said, voluptuous and it turned her into a passionate reader of English literature.

English became her other world, her secret language. She kept a diary in English because her family couldn’t read it, and this became the currency of her thoughts and feelings. She moved on from Snow White to Wuthering Heights and years later was disappointed that in Yorkshire she did not get lost in the moors. 

Liu Hong is now a best-selling author of four novels, all of which she wrote in English. 

Who can predict what the effect of a beautiful, well-written children’s book can be? Although she didn’t specify which edition of Snow White made her a reader–and eventually a writer, Liu Hong could well have been influenced by Randall Jarrell and Nancy Ekholm Burkert’s Caldecott Honor award winner, which was published in 1973. 

Who knows, when we donate to organizations– like Room to Read or Books for Laos– that make children’s books in English available overseas, what best-selling author of the future will be caught by the experience of reading in English and will go on to enrich other readers in years to come?

For my holiday gift this year, I received one of my favorite presents– a new country to love! It only took a few days to become thoroughly enchanted by southern Laos, which may be the most beautiful corner of the world that I’ve seen so far, with some of the kindest people to boot.

I was there before New Year’s, so schools had not yet closed for the holiday break, and I often passed crowds of meticulous, uniformed children on their way home at the end of the day, or playing in the schoolyards. When I saw them, I remembered the video that my friend Jessica Cotterill posted on her blog recently, showing a Laos school that she and her husband Colin had visited with books that they presented to the students.

Books for Laos is a labor of love that the Cotterills have been involved in for years, distributing books written in the Laos language to schoolchildren in conjunction with Big Brother Mouse, whose image adorns this post. Started by Sasha Alyson, formerly a U.S. publisher and now a resident of Luang Prabang, Laos, Big Brother Mouse writes, illustrates, publishes and distributes books written in the Laos language to children in Laos schools, while bestselling mystery author Colin Cotterill provides scholarship funds to hilltribe children, 75% of whom have no access to schools, so that they may eventually become teachers and return to teach others in their home areas.

Both of these organizations depend upon donations to survive and to carry on the work they have begun. For the cost of a daily latte, a child can learn to read, and can be the joyful recipient of the first book they have ever owned.

Please go to these websites, and to Jessica’s blog–you’ll be glad you did.