How do you choose a favourite?

I was in the very lucky position of judging the Prima Baby Awards the week before last.

One of the categories we were judging was books and of course it got me thinking - how do you decide on which book is best? Surely it is a very personal and subjective choice, based on your preferences?

They had some wonderful books but to decide which one was better than the others was for me, completely impossible. I love Hugless Douglas by David Melling but that was up against Debi Gliori Dragon Loves Penguin- how can you possibly decide? (They both got top marks from me!) The only book I did not give top marks to was an alphabet book- which was a lovely book but not phonically correct and I can't help myself; I think phonics have dripped into my blood- sad, I know.

That got me thinking about my favourite books- I could never have just one!

I'm a sucker for gorgeous illustrations as well as wonderful storytelling. Many of my favourite picture books combine both these aspects. I adore Quentin Blake and Lauren Child, not only for their great stories but also the illustrations. I'd love to have prints of their work on my walls.
I can't help myself, I do enjoy Guess How Much I love You by Sam McBratney - it seems to encapsulate my feelings for my children so exactly and the illustrations by Anita Jeram are just lovely. Then there are those picture books that take your breath away with the quality of the art work, like The Whale's Song by Dyan Sheldon and Gary Blythe. In fact my list would be almost endless!

For an older reader, I love the Anne of Green Gables books- the whole set. They are a part of my childhood and I have read them again and again. I have a lovely old set, they were my mother's and aunt's, and they are clearly loved and read-a-lot type of books.

Adult books are harder- one of my favourite authors is Guy Gavriel Kay. These books mix history (one of my great loves) with fantasy and they are always hauntingly beautiful.  'Under Heaven' set in ancient China has remained in my mind for a very long time and I'm looking forward to reading the next one.
I also loved The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay.  I certainly never thought I'd count a book about boxing as one of my favourites! (Don't read the sequel- it's nowhere like as good).

I feel I've barely scratched the surface with this thought- the more I pondered on my favourites the more books sprang to mind that I just had to consider. That lead me to thinking about developing a love of reading in children- one of the elements mentioned in the new National Curriculum. I can't remember anyone actually teaching me to love books, but I can remember many, many visits to the library. I can't remember learning to read but I can remember being read to. What I would want for my own children and for the children I teach, is that they have the same hard time trying to pick favourite books, because they have so many they absolutely love and they have that lasting pleasure in picking up a book and savouring it.

It's never too young....

It is never too young to start reading. Books should be one of the great joys of life and even really young babies can find that joy. My daughter had her library card at three weeks old. My son, then five, picked her books for her. He was fascinated by the black and white books suitable for really young babies and hunted for them among the shelves. We were lucky- our local library next to his school- has a wonderful selection of board books, picked by a very clued-up librarian. It is only a small library (Osidge Library in Barnet- they deserve a mention) but they have really well stocked shelves.
So my little girl started her reading journey. At first she managed a few seconds, with my son discovering, to his joy, that he could read her books to her. Now, at the grand age of five months she is very interested indeed. Her father reads to her every night and just like her brother she likes 'That's not my train' by F. Watts and R. Wells, as well as the books selected from the library. Unlike her brother she also gets to hear far more advanced material, such as James and the Giant Peach, if she is feeding while I'm reading my son his latest favourite. She also gets to hear him read, not only her library books but his books from school.
I was chatting to my hairdresser about going to the library. She is a lovely woman and a devoted mother, but it had simply never entered her head to take her baby to the library. She had no idea that there was such a wonderful selection suitable for babies, nor that she would get a Bookstart pack. So I wondered if other new parents had any idea about how to go about getting such great free resources. May be this is an opportunity for libraries and Bookstart to think about connecting with parents from birth. They put all sorts of things in the Bounty pack; why not library joining cards? At a time when yet more research shows children who visit the library do better at school, we need to be thinking of ways of getting children into the library and supporting parents to take them there. It seems like a missed opportunity to not grab parents from the word go. I would want every child to have the wonderful reading experiences my children have, because reading really is one of life's greatest pleasures.