The BFG, Skellig, Aubrey ... children’s books boom

Booksellers and new publications are challenging pessimism about reading habits

Once upon a time, nine-year-old bookworms used to curl up with Little Women, or burrow under the bedclothes with a torch to read Swallows and Amazons after hours. Childhood reading was an idyll in a walled garden and books forever shaped the landscape of our minds.

Did that golden age ever exist? One thing is certain: in troubled times the nation’s reading habits have become a lightning rod for parental pessimism about video games and the end of civilisation as we know it. There is, however, a silver lining to these clouds.

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from Children | The Guardian http://ift.tt/2wu7Jhs