Literacy Orgs I Love: Book Wish Foundation

I am a book lover, therefore I must be a passionate advocate for literacy for all. My current literary obsession is books about people doing amazing things for other people, basic human kindness. These books have given me tips on things I can do to help others besides donating money and I think one of the ways that I could possibly make a small impact is by highlighting literacy non-profits. I found some that I had never heard of before so maybe you will discover a new one that you want to donate your time/money to, but regardless all of these organizations are dedicated to spreading the love of books and education to all and who wouldn't support that? This will be a monthly post

1st up

Book Wish Foundation!

Image and excerpt from summary taken from bookwish.org/about

Book Wish Foundation is a 501(c)(3) public charity providing high-impact reading aid for people in crisis, with a current focus on refugees from Darfur and AIDS orphans in Ghana. We give some of the world's neediest readers the books they wish for, taking requests for specific titles and subjects. This helps ensure the books will be matched to the needs of the readers, and appropriate for their reading level and culture. We typically do not accept generic book donations from the public because they do not match the requests we receive. We do not hold book drives. The books that are most useful in a refugee camp might not be best-sellers in New York.

The populations we aid have very limited resources and are facing immense challenges for the foreseeable future. For them, books can play an especially large role in education, mental health, and job training. We search for the readers who will get the most out of our books because they have so little to begin with.

Maximizing the impact of books also means maximizing the number of readers, so we will provide reading glasses, vision screenings, support for literacy programs, solar-rechargeable lighting where there is no electricity, or any other aid that can effectively increase the audience for our books

I first discovered Book Wish Foundation when I was perusing the Penguin Fall 2011 releases newsletter. Actually the name of the organization didn't really register but I loved the idea behind the book that BookWish was working with Penguin and Better World Books. That book is What You Wish For: A Book for Darfur by various authors including Sofia Quintero, Nikki Giovanni, Francisco Stork, John Green, Ann Martin and Alexander McCall Smith.

Proceeds from the book go to building libraries in refugee camps for those from Darfur set in Chad. I pre-ordered the book from Better World Books so that 100% of the proceeds would go to the UN Refugee Agency. The book is now out but that doesn't many sales from the book won't go towards the building of libraries for Darfur refugees. I'm not sure how much of the proceeds though. It is advertised as YA but the stories seem to be a bit young. I'm not finished yet so they may get more mature, regardless they are lovely stories, not too dark but not pure sugar-coated happiness either.

Finally be sure you check out Book Wish Foundation's list of action tips you can do in 1 minute (and no donating is not the only tip on the list)!

It's Not Over: Publishing Needs to take the Hint (aka more cover failures) + POC Reading Challenge books needed!

Most of us (including me) have been celebrating over the fact that Bloomsbury is changing the cover of Magic Under Glass. But Bloomsbury is ignoring the point of this whole campaign, it's not just that the cover was inaccurate it's about the messages that the inaccuracy of covers portray. It's about publishing companies seeming to think that POC on book covers won't sell, especially in children's literature. That's a BIG problem. I want to know why do publishing companies think that? I would be most curious to see their survey results that say this, but more importantly, who cares? The publishing industry should be trying to publish books that reflect the world. The world is diverse so we need more diverse stories, especially in children's literature. I firmly believe that books teach tolerance, children won't learn to respect other cultures if there are few books about that culture. And the few books that are out there may have inaccurate covers! Bloomsbury's apology was not really an apology. They didn't acknowledge that they had done anything wrong, they were just sorry to 'cause offense.' Great, now explain why it happened in the first place and that it will never happen again. Are they even listening? I'm presuming Bloomsbury has read some of the articles about this issue, so they should publish a statement that's actually an apology and an explanation.

Here are some more examples of whitewashed covers that have been brought to my attention. And I'm kicking myself for missing the first one (I don't read much sci fi/fantasy so I probably would have missed the 2nd one).

1. The Mysterious Benedict Society series by Trenton Lee Stuart. Published by Little, Brown. Brought to my attention by Bookshelves of Doom (follow the link for more info and for illustrations that prove her point!). The books have feature a character named Sticky (I immediately thought of Sticky from the Proud Family, anyone know who I'm talking about? lol!) who is described as "a skinny boy with light brown skin [...] and a bald head." The illustrations inside the book portray this exactly right, an African American bald-headed boy. The covers (sorry for the small images!)? Not so much. They feature a white, bald-headed boy. There's only one bald-headed character in the books, so it

has to be Sticky. Now this is just stupid in my opinion. Why would you make a character look one way on a cover and another way in the inside illustrations? Think before you print, publishing companies, think!

ETA: I haven't read the books but my sister read the 1st one and thought it was ok. When I asked her about the cover she said that based on the description of Sticky she always thought he was Black.

2. The Dragon and the Stars Edited by Derwin Mak and Eric Choi. This is a sci fi/fantasy anthology of Chinese culture. It sounds amazing. The problem? (read the comments for a better explanation). The dragon on the cover is a Western dragon. Now I admit, I didn't know the difference, but it was explained to me and I did some research (like staring at the cover of Silver Phoenix, haha) of Oriental dragons. This was first brought to my attention and explained to me by Tarie. An Oriental dragon is long and thin with no wings (and I think a lot more colorful and pretty). And we all know what western dragons look like. Why would you put a Western dragon on a book about Chinese fantasy stories that include dragons? Seriously?!

These are the only two examples I currently know of. I'm disheartened and I'm sure there's more that I'm missing. I'm working on doing a post about the most POC-friendly publishing companies. We need to shine spotlights on the companies that do good and try and make the publishing companies that aren't very diverse see why this is important and yes we have to call them out.

So what can we do? Do what you did for Magic Under Glass. Blog about this issue, email publishers and buy/read/review books about POC! Which leads me to the POC Reading Challenge. I'm co-administrator of this challenge along with Pam and Katy and it's going to be awesome! I'm so excited, but I want to see more participation :) I want to have lots of prizes, but lots of prizes cost money. So I would LOVE you forever ;) if you could donate a book to the challenge as a prize. I'm going to contribute something too (that's what babysitting and summer jobs are for) but I want to have a diverse

round of prizes.

What do we need? Adult and YA books about POC only (or bookstore giftcards)! I'm not sure how many YA and adult fiction bloggers we have doing the challenge (and we may need some MG, I'll have to check). So authors and fellow bloggers (especially my bloggers of color), would you consider donating a book about a POC as a prize? Let's help get books about POC into the hands of readers who want to read about them. Now I totally understand if you don't want to because you only have one copy of a book, I have to own all my favorite books (even if I've already read them). But if you have extra copies of a book or you don't need to own your books and are willing to give it away (I'm awful because I don't like borrowing, I'd rather trade and be done!) it would so be appreciated! You can email me or leave a comment here or at the challenge blog or email Pam or Katy. Thank you in advance!