All across the country, Canada 150 celebrations are taking place. Folks are gearing up everywhere for summer events. Here at AVRL, we have been celebrating since January with Book Club 150. Each month, we feature a different Canadian storyteller. By storyteller, we mean author or illustrator. We chose the word storyteller because we feel that pictures tell stories as much as words do. A picture is worth a thousand words, eh? We invite you to join our celebrations. As the weather warms, and we really get into things, we hope to bring you even more storyteller goodness.

Frankentink prizeWin one of the monthly Prizes  That’s right, each month we are giving away prizes as part of Book Club 150. Each month we will give away a book by the featured storyteller. Many of these books were donated by the publishers (THANKS, publishers!). Some months, we have exciting Prize Packs. For instance, in April, we are giving away a Giant Sized Frankenstink Swag Bag, full of goodies from Ron & Sandra Lightburn. Entering is easy– visit your local library branch for a ballot, or tag us online with #BookClub150.  Hop over to our Book Club 150 page for all the details, and stay tuned, because we have some really amazing prizes coming up.

Meet a real live author or illustrator  We’ve already got a couple of events scheduled, including a reading and craft day with Ron Lightburn on April 22, and a reading with Christy Ann Conlin on May 31. We are working with the Nova Scotia Library Association to bring even more authors and illustrators to the Valley, so keep an eye out for those. We are looking forward to sharing Canada’s stories with you.

Join the conversation online or at home  Each month we will ask questions and provide conversation prompts online. Please join in! We also have Book Club in A Bag kits — a bag of 8 books that you can borrow and host your own Book Club at home. Our contests and conversations can be found on Twitter and Facebook, so give us a follow! We also post pics on Instagram, so you’ll want to check in there as well.

We hope that Book Club 150 can introduce you to a new favourite storyteller, or help you celebrate one of your current favs. Keep an eye out for Libraries 150/150 Books of Influence, sponsored by the NSLA, for even more Canadian stories, Nova Scotia style.