19 Dec 2011 20:37:05
Tens of thousands of copies of classic titles by authors including Maya Angelou, Dave Eggers, Alice Sebold and John Irving are set to be given away across America next April as part of the US's first celebration of World Book Night.
Inaugurated in the UK in April this year, 2012 will see America joining in the 1m-book giveaway on 23 April. American organisers have now announced the line-up of 30 titles, which 50,000 US volunteers will be handing out on the day, ranging from post-apocalyptic nightmare in Stephen King's The Stand to the 1960s in the Congo in Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, from Rebecca Skloot's investigation of the life of the Southern tobacco farmer whose cancer cells changed modern medicine, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, to Alice Sebold's novel about the rape and murder of a teenager, The Lovely Bones.
Sherman Alexie was picked for his award-winning – and frequently complained about – young adult novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Suzanne Collins for her bestselling young adult dystopian tale The Hunger Games and Patti Smith for her memoir Just Kids. Covering genres including crime and science fiction as well as prize-winning literary fiction and non-fiction, the US list features just one title which also appears on the line-up for the UK's World Book Night giveaway next year: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.
"We want the book givers to reach out to new or light readers, especially in underserved places like nursing homes, schools, hospitals and poor neighbourhoods, but also in public gathering places like coffee shops and malls. And by offering a range of fiction, non-fiction and books for teens, we believe we have great books that the givers will be passionate about handing out, and will appeal to a wide audience of potential new readers," said World Book Night US executive director Carl Lennertz.
Alexie said he was "honoured" to take part in "a celebration of the individual book and the individual reader", while his fellow author Kate DiCamillo, chosen for her classic children's novel Because of Winn-Dixie, felt it made "perfect sense" that World Book Night would take place in the spring. "Extending your hand to give someone a book, a story, is a gesture of hope and joy. It is a chance for all of us, givers and receivers, to break into blossom," she said.
The campaign will be headed by honorary national chairperson Anna Quindlen, the Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and author, who called the idea behind World Book Night "inspired". ""What's better than a good book? A whole box of them, and the opportunity to share them with new readers," she said. Volunteers are now able to apply to be a book-giver on 23 April.
