Both Gumboot Books and Once Upon a Huckleberry Bush are unique in the children’s and young adult literature world. Gumboot Books is an eco-friendly publishing house that specializes in “Books with a Conscience”. Besides encouraging people of all ages to read and write, they aim to foster a sense of social responsibility and respect for our planet; and guarantee that all the books they publish are responsibly produced. They are printed in North America, inks are child-safe, and the paper is old-growth-fibre free.

Once Upon a Huckleberry Bush is a special, independent book store, which aims to:

nurture the world through storytelling, reintroducing myths that will promote a strong sense of local community and global involvement. This company endeavors to promote tolerance, love and compassion. Dedicated to young readers in the hopes of cultivating a lifelong love for books, Once Upon a Huckleberry Bush [...] offers many special events and activities, including regular story time, organized book clubs to help develop reading skills and interests, and contests to cultivate kids’ imaginations and storytelling abilities.

Unfortunately I won’t be able to attend this Fall Book Launch as I will be out of town. But for those of you in Vancouver, drop on by the book store! Book readings will be held throughout the day and the line-up includes:

Fly Catcher Boy by Rebecca Kool, illustrated by David Namisato;

When Chickens Fly by Kari-Lynn Winters and Izabela Bzymek;

aRYTHMetique by Tiffany Stone, Kari-Lynn Winters and Lori Sherritt-Fleming, illustrated by Scot Ritchie – this book has two versions: English and French; the launch will be conducted in French.

Ready for R by Marian MacDougall and Silvana Bevilacqua – a special book written by experienced speech language pathologists and designed to spark speech, language and literacy development; inspire story-telling; and encourage ESL students.

It’s All Greek to Me, Jack by Dan Bar-el;

The Midnight Blue Marble by Melanie Jackson.

For me, the biggest thrill was finally meeting author Margriet Ruurs in person. Here she is reading her newest book My School in the Rain Forest to the kids. They loved the photos in this book and it was a real eye-opener for them to see some of the schools that kids attend. Thea was most interested in the Egypt page (“Wow – they can see the pyramids from their school!”) and Emma wished she could move to Scotland so she could attend school in a castle! Besides showing readers how schools differ throughout the world, Margriet has another goal for this book: to generate student interest in service learning and to encourage students to adopt a library or school in need of books or teaching resources. Click here to read Margriet’s ideas on this.

The photo to the right shows a book that is truly hot off the press! Author Rebecca Kool had only received this copy of Fly Catcher Boy from the printer a few hours earlier and the kids were quite impressed when she showed them that this was copy #1.

Written in English and using Japanese words and expressions throughout the text, Fly Catcher Boy tells the story of Kenji, who is alone during a thunderstorm one night when he is startled by a noise outside and finds a wet and miserable cat on his doorstep. He brings the cat inside and after introductions to his grandmother the next morning, Kenji and his new friend set off on adventures in their small Japanese town. The book also contains a glossary for phonetic pronunciation and the kanji letter for each Japanese word.

Here’s David J. Smith with his book If the World Were a Village. This book is a classic in our house so Emma and I were especially pleased to get a chance to talk to David and to see his newest book, If America Were a Village. This book uses the same concept as If the World Were a Village and shrinks America down to a village of 100 people, thereby helping children to reach a clearer understanding of the ethnic origins, religions, family profiles, occupations, wealth, belongings and more that make up the Unites States. David also shared with us that next year he will be releasing a book based on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

At the start of the festival, every child was given a bag to collect book marks, stickers, autographs, pencils etc. from the authors and illustrators. By the time we were ready to leave, the bags were overflowing with treasures! We stopped for a piece of cake and then we visited the Kidsbook sales booth where Emma, Thea and Will each chose a book to purchase. Emma’s first choice was My School in the Rain Forest but I already had a copy on order: so she and Thea each went with Fred and Pete at the Beach by Cynthia Nugent, while Will chose Alfalfabet A to Z – The Wonderful Words from Agriculture written by Carol Watterson and illustrated by Michela Sorrentino.

Our congratulations go out to the Children’s Writers and Illustrators of British Columbia (CWILL BC) and to the North Vancouver City Library for putting on such a great event. To all the writers and illustrators who spent time talking with us, sharing their books, signing autographs and giving the kids special treasures, we say THANK YOU.

To see more photos from the event check out CWILL BC’s blog.