A bookshop in South East London is encouraging children to enjoy reading through offering a wider ranger of diverse books.
Moon Lane Books, in Catford, aims is to address the lack of representation in books to allow every child the opportunity to read about characters they resonate with, from different cultures to disability to religion.
Assistant manager Abida Khanom said: “It’s almost like a brightness takes over them when they see themselves within a book.”
She has seen firsthand the impact the bookshop has had in sparking joy within young readers through the diverse selection of books they offer starring characters from a variety of backgrounds.
Khanom said: “We had a kid who came in that really loved the Diary of the Wimpy Kid and loved all these heavy illustrated books and came from a Pakistani background.
“And I was like, you know what I have for you? I have this book that has all of that and you within it.
“And then seeing him come back constantly, like, do you have the next book? Do you have the next book?
“I was like, you’re going to have to wait for the author to release another one.
“It’s that joy that you see almost immediately. It’s something that we find fulfilling and something that we find joy in ourselves.”
Research by the National Literacy Trust has highlighted the importance of children and young people seeing themselves and each other in the books they read, with a 2022 report finding that 2 in 5 children felt that reading about characters like them made them feel more confident.
Lucy Starbuck Braidley, Senior Programme Manager of Reading for Enjoyment at the National Literacy Trust, said: “It’s crucial that all children have access to a diverse choice of stories.”
Braidley also says that choice is fundamental to supporting reading for enjoyment and allows children to have agency over what they read and develop their own areas of interest.
“We know that children are more motivated to read when it’s a format or genre that appeals to them, and something like a graphic novel or a book about football can be the gateway for them to choose to read for pleasure,” said Braidley.
Moon Lane Books is promoting this through their unique offering of children’s books, in addition to working closely with authors and publishers to hold community events.
They recently collaborated with The Emma Press, an independent publishers who focus on children’s books, to invite one of their illustrators for an event.
Georgia Wall, publishing manager at The Emma Press, said the partnership formed after her friend visited Moon Lane Books and told her about their workshops and collection.
Wall said: “We publish a range of prose and poetry for adults and children, some of which is stocked in Abida’s lovely shop as I’ve seen with my own eyes”.
Latvian illustrator Elīna Brasliņa, who has illustrated children’s books for more than 10 years, led an interactive workshop in February as a result of the collaboration.
She sparked the children’s creativity through a translation activity of a Latvian poem.
Braslina said: “I had prepared a Google Translate version from Latvian to English, and it turned out really wonky and a bit awkward.
“We brushed it up, added onto it, and afterwards we illustrated an alternative ending or another surprise ending for the poem.
“I think it turned out really well because there were children from different language backgrounds. There were people who were French speaking, Polish speaking and other languages in the room. So we all had this immersive language plus illustration experience and the parents seemed to enjoy it.”
After her previous work illustrating a book, The Dog Who Found Sorrow, based on the difficulty of translation, Braslina believes and demonstrates that illustration is a form of translation.
“Our very first readers might be readers that don’t read at all, they just see pictures. So you’re the very first translator for the text, you have to be very conscious of that for children’s books, especially for smaller children.”
Feature Image Credit: Moon Lane Books
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