HEY GUYS!!!

One, @neil-gaiman is one of the best things in this world and I love him.

But TWO, and more importantly as regards this post:

If you didn’t grow up in the 1980s or 1990s, you may not remember Reading Rainbow. It was a show where LeVar Burton would take you on a tour or activity that was related to the book the show was about to read out loud for you, and then a narrator would read the book (sometimes Burton, sometimes someone else). At the end, Burton would tie the activity and the book together, and then say there were lots of other great books like it, “but don’t take my word for it.” Then you’d get book recommendations from a couple of school-aged kids, different ones in most episodes. It, along with Wishbone, was part of a PBS effort to promote childhood literacy. Many of the books the show shared were also culturally diverse–I was a little kid at the time and so obviously remember the actual titles of very few, but I remember multiple books about Black and Latine kids, titles set in different time periods, and at least one about a Chinese character. The activities for these episodes often focused on the culture of the child in the book, but not in a weird tokeny way–like one was a book I think was called The Patchwork Quilt and the tour part was talking about how cool and important quilting was in history and to certain cultural communities. Sadly, the show was cancelled in 2003, and although Burton spearheaded a Kickstarter that made the show available in classrooms, nothing like it has ever aired on TV again.

Having watched Reading Rainbow from preschool until I was in fifth or sixth grade, I cannot overstate how expertly Burton will do this. And so I am asking: IF YOU PERSONALLY KNOW ANY AUTHORS OF CHILDREN'S’ BOOKS, OR ARE SUCH AN AUTHOR YOURSELF, PLEASE REACH OUT TO TRY TO GET MORE BOOKS INTO HIS HANDS. This is a wonderful project–and sadly, who knows how long we’re going to need it.