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Once a month I lead a book group for 8-12 year olds at our local public library and our most recent session was about science fiction books. It was one of the most enjoyable sessions we’ve had, so I thought I’d share what we did.

My first challenge was to come up with a list of science fiction which 8-12 year olds might enjoy. This wasn’t such an easy task, but in the end my book list read like this:

Several people helped me come up with this list (thank you!), but I’d like to give a special shout out to author SF Said who was tremendously helpful in making suggestions about books I might like to consider.

I knew that most of the kids in my group hadn’t read any science fiction at all (though most had seen either some Dr Who episodes or the Star Wars films), and so first we had a discussion about what we mean when we talk about science fiction in relation to books. The definition we came up with was:

Fiction which typically focuses on:

As the aim of the session was to get the kids exposed to a wide variety of SF, and to choose at find at least one SF book which they thought looked interesting enough to read, I wanted to expose them to lots of different books in the short time we had. And so I came up with a board game which the group played in teams.

All the books on my list above, plus some space-themed poetry and space non-fiction books were placed in the centre of our table, and each team was give a game template, a dice and a lego spaceman or alien as their counter.

The aim of the game was for each team to get to the end of the board game (set out a little like snakes and ladders ie with the possibility of having to move forward and backwards on the board), collecting as many (glow in the dark) stars as possible along the way. Teams won stars by correctly answering questions associated with the numbered star they landed on each time they rolled the dice.

All the questions were about the books in the centre of the table, and so to find the answers, the kids had to do a lot of browsing. Some questions were very simple (“Who is the author of X”), some involved a value judgment (“Choose three words to describe the illustrations in Y”) and some required more in-depth browsing inside books (eg “Which book opens with the lines XYX” or “Which book is set in X”). When each team had found the answer to a given question they came and gave me the answer, and if it was correct (or simply reasonably thoughtful in the case of value judgments), the team got a star and returned to roll the dice for their next question.

The game was over when every team had reached the end point on the board, and the winning team was that which had collected the most stars. The victors each won a Mars bar (you get the space connection?) and the book of their choice from a small selection I brought with me from my past review pile.

Once winnings had been distributed we went round the group and everyone had to pick up one book which had caught their eye, and comment on what it was about the book that they liked the look of.

The session went with a blast (no pun intended, but I’m happy to keep it in ). I think it worked so well because:

If you’d like to try the game out you can download a copy of this board game here (pdf) but you’ll need to create your own set of questions to go with whichever books you’re using in your session. You’ll see on the board that there are time warps (they look like tornadoes), a teleporter, and two tardises (tardi?) – if kids landed on these they had the choice to go forwards or backwards along the board, and pretty soon they realised that it was actually beneficial to move back wherever possible as this gave the team the chance to win more stars.

Next month’s bookgroup meeting is actually all about celebrating our first birthday, so if you’ve any suggestions for great book-themed party games to play, I’d really love to hear about them!

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If you liked this post you might enjoy two past posts of mine: 7 ways to set up and run a children’s book group or Book Bingo!.

It all began with a jokey conversation on Twitter.

Polly (who has her début collection of stories, Mango & Bambang: The Not-a-Pig, out this September, illustrated by Clara Vulliamy) shared a picture of an igloo built of books and from there, things pretty quickly spiralled out of control.

I just knew I had to build something out of books. It was one of those moments where you are vaguely aware that the idea is slightly bonkers but you know the thought won’t leave you alone until you succumb to it.

And so it was I set about planning to build a book den out of books, using the opportunity to raise some funds for a charity I’ve a long-standing relationship with, Book Aid International.

First I did my research and scoured the web for other buildings made from books.

Then I started stockpiling books from all over my home in one place.

It was rather disconcerting to see my shelves gradually empty.

I stocked up on coffee and cake and then World Book Day arrived.

It was time to start building.

The kitchen table was dismantled to create enough space for the den; I knew I wanted it to be large enough to comfortably sit inside and read.

Then building began in earnest. I used encyclopedias and other large non-fiction books to create foundations. The big Dorling Kindersley books were excellent for providing stability!

Although my hands got very dry handling all the books, and there were dust fairies flying everywhere, it was a sheer delight to go through my books, remembering when and where I’d read them, who had given them to me, who I’d given copies to. It was a little like watching my life on a screen before me, going through so many memories of people, places and times.

Much as I adore picture books, I soon learned that paperback picture books are not the best thing to build with; you need about a zillion to gain any height, and they tend to be rather slippy. Topsy and Tim books and Beatrix Potter books worked excellently for chinking, but the books I really loved building with were great tomes like SF Said’s Phoenix, or Marcus Alexander’s Charlie Keeper books; these are not only immensely satisfying to read, they give you a real sense of achievement and reliable strength when building!

My biggest worry in all the building was the roof. I really wanted to build using the fabulous technique seen in Maes Howe and other chambered cairns I’ve visited in Orkney, a technique known as corbelling (here’s a good example, and one I’m hoping to revisit this summer), but I felt that for safety’s sake I had to go for something more lightweight.

Thanks to inspiration from my engineer Dad I decided to give magazine and comic tiling a go instead. And I’m very pleased I did so! (Thanks, Dad!)

All in all, once the books were stockpiled, it took me about five hours to build. It’s only up for 24 hours, but we’ve made excellent use of it in this time.

We’ve eaten in it, read in it, simply relaxed in it, giggled in it and generally had a VERY good time!

Late last night I was going to treat myself to a glass of wine and a little bit of piece and quiet in it, but when I went into the kitchen I found my eldest has snuck out of bed to read in it!

I left her to it and took my wine elsewhere

And now it is the morning after the night before and shortly I’ll begin dismantling my dear book den. But what did I learn in the process? What are my top tips for building with books?

NOW. Before you click on to your next blog or read your next email, here comes the serious bit.

I did all of this to raise funds for Book Aid International, and it’s not too late to add a small donation (you can donate from anywhere in the world, in several local currencies):

If you’ve ever enjoyed my blog or my banter on Twitter, please consider donating a small amount today. Book Aid International works in partnership with libraries in Africa, including in Zambia where I was born (hence my support of this charity), providing books, resources and training to support an environment in which reading for pleasure, study and lifelong learning can flourish.

I want to say an enormous THANK YOU to everyone who has already donated, including Daisy, Katherine, Anamaria, Elli, Zehra, Damyanti, Catherine, Polly, Jonathan, Ann, Helen, Anabel, Melanie, Abi, Book Island, my parents, my sister, Emma, Clare, Colin, Anne-Marie, Lizz, Natalie, Maxine, Sara, Kate, Bea, Tasha, Sam, Susie, Sandra, SF, Christine, James, Anne, Dan, @storyvilled, Alex, Nicky, @OlivaceousD and all the anonymous donors. YOU are the real stars in all of this.

I just wanted to briefly share a couple of really wonderful books I read recently. In keeping with my unofficial rules these books are illustrated ( I try to only "review"books with pictures ) . They are also very different. Varjak Paw is a young adult novel all about cats. It's a quest story and is told with a wonderful economy and eloquence. I bought it for thew pictures but was delighted to find the story was great too. Varjak Paw is written by S F Said and illustrated by Dave McKean. A glance at Mr. McKean's work-especially his pen and ink work-will tell you what a profound impact he has had on me. He did an amazing comic series in the 90's called Cages but I think his children's book stuff is his best work. He also illustrated The Graveyard book, which i talked about in a previous post. I highly recommend this book.
Next is Enrico Casarosa's comic book story The Venice Chronicles, which is like a sketch log/story about visiting the country of his birth with his girlfriend. Enrico is an amazing artist and animator and is the founder of the international SketchCrawl. And is also one of the wonderful people responsible for the Totoro Forest Project. This book is just beautiful. The story is simple and engaging but for me the highlight is the paintings of Venice accompanied by childhood memories.I could't put the book down, I was transported to distant Venice. For anyone who's been to Venice it will recall what an incredible place it is to you. Really magical.