Jolabokaflod!

Gateacre School staff and pupils from the multi award-winning community venture The BIG Little Library celebrated a traditional celebration by giving away brand new books for Christmas.

The campaign was in conjunction with BookTrust, the UK’s largest children’s reading charity and Belle Vale shopping centre in Liverpool. They also had 100’s of nearly new books which were kindly donated by the former Ticket to Read Project in Woolton Village.

The idea for the library came about from a simple idea; wanting to help improve literacy within the community.

In Iceland, books are exchanged on Christmas eve, and you spend the rest of the night reading. People generally take their books to bed along with some chocolate.

The tradition, known as Jolabokaflod, which means ‘Christmas Book Flood’ a tradition that dates back to World War Two when foreign imports were restricted but paper was relatively inexpensive.

Lisa Mitchell, who heads up The BIG Little Library said: “The books are for all ages, from babies up to young adults, and we hope that not only will this event help ease the monetary pressure of Christmas, but it will also start a tradition with families and friends to give and receive books and spread the love of reading for pleasure.

“This is the second time we held a Book Flood, and myself and the Gateacre students can’t wait to get as many children as possible excited about reading.”

Belle Vale Shopping Centre kindly gave the BIG Little Library a second shop unit to hold the Book Flood.

In total just over 1800 books were given away. This now brings the total amount of books given away by The BIG Little Library to over 87,000 books!

They have also raised £500 for Claire House in memory Peter Morgan, of one of their volunteers.