by Alicia Rudnicki, Library Mix

Books are like seeds containing so many possibilities — from blissful escape to immersion in valuable information. To make the contents blossom, all we have do is take time to read.  

Giving a copy of a book you love to a reluctant reader or someone who has limited access to books is an act of nurturance similar to improving the soil in a garden. It aids growth.

This week, tens of thousands of World Book Night volunteers in Europe and the United States planted helped the joy of reading grow in places ranging from beauty parlors to prisons. Each volunteer, including me, distributed 20 copies of a favorite book chosen from a long list of quality bestsellers. This added up to 2.5 million books.

World Book Night is the largest book giveaway event in the world. Although I handed out my books today, most volunteers distributed theirs the evening of April 23, which marked the second annual World Book Night in England and Ireland and the event’s first time in the United States and Germany.

So, although a bit tardy, I celebrated what I called my “world book afternoon” today by dropping 20 copies of one of my favorite books, like seeds, in the hands of students at a youth detention center. I gave them a memoir about an extremely difficult yet hopeful childhood, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls.

Participation made me feel wealthy yet cost me nothing, except some unpaid time off from work.

The British and U.S. World Book Night organizations are nonprofits that make the giveaway possible through donations. Participating authors forgo royalties. Publishers, paper manufacturers, printers and others donate funds and services to produce and ship the books to libraries and bookstores where volunteers pick them up.

Eventually, World Book Night organizers hope to add other countries to their project aimed at fostering love of the printed page.  

Good reading has always helped me to relax and get away from worries. It heals me when I am down and helps me drift off to sleep a happier person.

Young people in youth detention centers have plenty of worries and little freedom. Although restrictions in youth centers are necessary, they are wearing. Basic rights that most teens take for granted don’t exist, such as boys and girls not being allowed in the same room. Simple materials, including pencils and paper, aren’t allowed beyond classroom doors due to concerns about inventive weaponry.

I discovered that being given a book for one’s limited collection of personal property is a big deal even if a guard must transport the book from classroom to dorm. It is yours, and you don't ever have to return it to the library. When the book is in your hands, you are free to wander its pages.

A book is a safe place where you can go when nothing seems to be going right. And for the volunteer who put it in your hands, it is the gateway to a garden of good wishes for a better life.