The huge public demand for libraries’ work with young readers has been illustrated by the results pouring in from the 2011 Summer Reading Challenge. It looks set to have been a record year, with around 780,000 children participating - an increase of 20,000 children from last year.

We’d like to thank and congratulate everyone in libraries. It’s a huge achievement to have delivered these results in the toughest times our sector has seen for decades. It’s vital for libraries’ future that decision makers hear positive news and evidence of libraries’ impact, so we will be publicising these results far and wide.

Summer Reading Challenge

CELEBRATING RECORD FIGURES: The Summer Reading Challenge looks set to account for 20% of all books issued to children in a year. 53,000 children joined their local library for the first time to take part, and it looks like 44% of the children who took part were boys. Many were supported by teenage volunteers from secondary schools, such as Beth Johnson from Stourbridge Library, who found creative ways of encouraging children to join up. "We had a Dalek which brought a lot of people into the library and encouraged many children to sign up. It led to most of the Doctor Who books being taken out by children doing the Summer Reading Challenge." Our Summer Reading Challenge volunteering project was supported by the John Laing Charitable Trust and saw over 3000 young people volunteer across all authorities throughout the summer.

LIBRARY SPOTLIGHT: there have been a host of award ceremonies for those taking part. We very much enjoyed the event at Peckham Library, where families gathered to celebrate Southwark’s highest participation rate yet. Over five and a half thousand children participated in the Borough’s 12 libraries, with 842 children at Peckham Library alone.

The Mayor of Southwark awarded medals and certificates and thanked the librarians present: "Thank you for all the hard work and dedication you continue to show for this Borough, day in, day out - you are a cherished service and an inspiring group of individuals. Long may your efforts continue."

Reading groups for everyone

NEARLY AT 2000 GROUPS: Nearly 2000 reading groups have registered with Reading Groups for Everyone – which is fantastic news. Sign up to add your group to the website and be in the running for a special prize for the 2000th group that joins. All groups that sign up get information about offers from publishers including free books, author visits and competitions. See www.readinggroups.org

Publisher Partners

NON-FICTION BOOKS FOR READING GROUPS: We are delighted to welcome Palgrave Macmillan to our programme, which builds partnerships with libraries and publishers. This gives us an exciting opportunity to introduce more non-fiction titles to reading groups, including The Shakespeare Thefts, a literary detective story about the amazing stories behind the stolen First Folios. Plus The Favoured Daughter, the true story of an Afghani woman who became the first female speaker of the Afghani Parliament and a leading contender for president in 2014. All our offers for reading for groups are on www.readinggroups.org/offers

MILLS & BOON WRITING WORKSHOPS: We had a tremendous response to our Mills & Boon New Voices workshops. These put a twist on library events by placing authors and editors in libraries across the country to help aspiring romantic-fiction writers. The fully-booked events are part of Mills and Boon's search for new authors and went down well with librarians, authors and readers.

MyVoice

AUTHOR VISIT: We’ve had some great feedback from the young people in our MyVoice programme following a visit by US best-selling author Gregg Olsen. It was organised by MyVoice volunteers who set up the venues, looked after Gregg, introduced the sessions, and filming Gregg’s talks. Gregg visited Padgate Library, Warrington, and libraries in Lancashire. Gregg was promoting Envy, his first book aimed at the teen market. Young people shared their own stories on the novel’s theme of cyber bullying. The young people who came said things like: “Lovely talk, enjoyed it very much. I learnt what the mind of a very famous author is like.” And “It was mega. He didn’t treat us like kids. He was funny.” Keep up to date at the MyVoice facebook page. MyVoice is funded by the Dulverton Trust and Big Lottery Fund.

Six Book Challenge

AMBASSADOR: We’re delighted to announce that bestselling writer Adele Parks has agreed to become our first Ambassador for the Six Book Challenge during 2012. Adele has always been a passionate supporter of libraries and of giving everyone a chance to enjoy reading, so it’s particularly appropriate that she’s agreed to support our programme for less confident readers.

"Reading is the ultimate in entertainment, education, inspiration and escapism. Reading taught me not to accept limits and I'm thrilled to be working with The Reading Agency as Ambassador to the Six Book Challenge in 2012 to support other readers who are refusing to accept limits and are motivated to embrace every opportunity that reading offers.”

Those who complete the Six Book Challenge in 2012 will receive a certificate signed by Adele Parks in her role as Ambassador for the scheme. Adele will also be able to attend a library launch event early in 2012 and a celebration event next summer.

PRIZES: McVitie’s Learn 4 U Centre in Manchester celebrated winning this year’s workpace draw with bestselling novelist and former SAS operative Andy McNab. Congratulations also to the Literacy and ESOL group at Harlesden Library in Brent and Chatty Readers run by Southend Libraries who are the winners of our prizes for Chatabout members who have uploaded their groups to Reading Groups for Everyone. They will receive a reading group set of one of two titles kindly donated by publishers Barrington Stoke - Hot Flush by Helen FitzGerald and Sawbones by Stuart MacBride. Now that Reading Groups for Everyone has tips for emergent reader groups, we’re encouraging people who joined our Chatabout online network to add their groups to the database so that they can receive offers from publishers. Sign up now!

Meanwhile, if you haven’t yet ordered your materials for Six Book Challenge 2012 please visit the Shop to see the range of print and incentives on offer.

Quick Reads

VALENTINE’S DAY LAUNCH: This year’s Quick Reads will launch on Tuesday 14 February 2012, with eight fantastic new books available in libraries from 2 February. This year's selection includes best-selling authors Lynda La Plante, Alexander McCall Smith and Tony Parsons. Galaxy are continuing to support Quick Reads and the 2012 titles will be launched through a huge Fall in Love with Reading campaign. If you are a library authority, you can sign up to receive news about Quick Reads, as well as downloadable resources. More information at Reading Groups for Everyone.

Chatterbooks reading groups

COMPETITION: Win a sleepover at the British Museum. Members of Chatterbooks groups can win tickets to a British Museum sleepover by entering the Mega Mash-Up ‘design a poster’ competition - the deadline has been extended to 7 November so there's time to get your entry in for this fantastic opportunity. For details see Reading Groups for Everyone.

Clonclyfrau/Chatterbooks

NEW WELSH PARTNERSHIP: We have entered a partnership with Welsh Government and the Welsh Books Council that means we can support for library services who want to set up and run reading groups for children in Wales.

We are currently designing Welsh/English bilingual materials to support Chatterbooks groups in Wales – under the new name of Clonclyfrau/ Chatterbooks. Launching in January 2012, these will be offered at the same price as English materials, thanks to support from the Welsh Government, CyMAL and the Welsh Books Council.

In the meantime, we are offering two training courses to get Clonclyfrau /Chatterbooks groups up and running - in Llandudno on 16 November and Cardiff on 18 November. For more information, contact Lynne Taylor.

Children’s library/publisher partnership

NEW ROADSHOW: Our next roadshow, bringing librarians and publishers together to share information and ideas, will be at Bristol Schools Library Service on Tuesday 29 November. The Etherington Brothers of DFC comic books fame will be there. Our children’s library and publisher roadshows are extremely popular – leading to useful connections and creative ways of collaborating to inspire more children to read more. Librarians and publishers who would like to come should contact Jenny Warner. We are very grateful to Bertram Library Services and Cyprus Well, the literature development agency for South West England, who are supporting this event.

Chatterbooks Reads!

NEW TITLES: Our regular monthly promotion of the very best new titles in children’s reading as chosen by librarians, publishers and Chatterbooks reading groups is available now. See the full autumn list and download this month’s poster for the November promotions. Look out for online reviews of the latest books written by children who are members of Chatterbooks reading groups.

We are delighted to have been awarded funding from the Arts Council to run a new Mood-boosting Books promotion. Mood-boosting Books will be launched in January 2012, with a brand-new booklist and promotional material. Look out for further details on how to sign up on www.readinggroups.org nearer the time.