1365 children aged 4 months to 18 years from all over the country will receive their dream book for Christmas. This became possible thanks to the initiative “A child is waiting for magic! Become a magician – give him a book”, which was held by National Network for Children within the Sofia International Literary Festival for Children and Youth with the support of Experience Bulgaria.
Every fifth child in Bulgaria does not have books suitable for his age, and some children have never opened a book. That is why National Network for Children is conducting the initiative for the second year in a row with the aim of introducing all children to the magical world of reading. The campaign will be annual to stimulate interest in books and support more children to have their own library.
In just 20 days – from November 25 to December 15, in a specially created platform and with the help of member organizations of the Children’s Network were collected wishes for specific titles of children from across the country who rarely receive books – from poor families, children survivors violence, children who do not live with their parents. They were responded to by “magicians” from Bulgaria and the world, who had the opportunity to choose a book from the list on the site, buy and send it to the child who wanted it. Quite unexpectedly, only in the first three days of the campaign nearly 900 wishes were accepted by participants. It became clear that the children who will receive a book are twice as many as the first edition of the initiative.
So in the last few weeks Pippi Longstocking, Elin Pelin’s stories, stories about princesses, the history of Bulgarian football, encyclopedias, poems, riddles and many other interesting books travel to children to reach them for Christmas.
