Read and release
You’ve heard of catch and release, but what about read and release? That’s the idea behind a fun website called Book Crossing – you read a book and instead of putting it in a garage sale, you release it into the wild. You attach a note to the book with a special code from the website, and when someone finds the book, they go to the website, enter the code and a message. Then they release the book again.
Our seven year old wanted to give it a try as a way of celebrating Family Literacy Week, so we went on the website and found that there’s a lot of activity here on the central island. You just find the name of your town – Nanaimo, Parksville, Qualicum Beach, Ladysmith, Bowser, Coombs… you name it, you’ll probably find it. Then under each town there are suggested locations, from your local coffee shop to “the laundromat just behind the Shell station”.
Grace chose the Starbucks at Woodgrove Mall (oh the silent messages we send our children 
). And so it was one sunny afternoon that we said goodbye to the book, went home, and waited. Less than a day later, there was a message from a little girl named Anika who had found the book. Now she’ll read it and pass it along. Maybe she’ll drop it off in Vancouver, and then someone finds it there and takes it on a trip to Toronto and leaves it there, where it’s found by someone visiting from France, who then…
