Pilot scheme to send book parcels to children in care

Carnegie medal-winning children's author Siobhan Dowd believed that "if a child can read, they can think; and if a child can think they are free". Now the trust the late Irish author established in the few days before she died is launching a pilot scheme that will bring JRR Tolkien and other writers to children in care. Dowd died of cancer in 2007, aged just 47. Last year she became the first author to be posthumously awarded the Carnegie medal, for her final novel Bog Child. Shortly before she died she set up a trust supporting "disadvantaged young readers", to which the royalties from her four books go. Its trustees have just announced that they will be funding a new initiative aimed at 11 to 13-year-old children in care. Sixty children in 12 local authorities across the UK will be sent parcels of books including The Hobbit, Ian Serraillier's story of three children's search for their parents across war-torn Europe The Silver Sword, a manga version of Romeo and Juliet, Dowd's own London Eye Mystery, in which a boy with Asperger's Syndrome solves a mystery, Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief and Guinness World Records. Children's author Tony Bradman, chair of the trust, said the pilot, which launches this month, was "exactly the kind of initiative" it wanted to support. "This kind of support for looked-after children is even more important in these times of spending cuts," said the author, best known for his Dilly the Dinosaur stories. It was Bradman's invitation to Dowd to contribute a story about a "Pavee" (Irish traveller) to his short story collection for children about racism, Skin Deep, that launched her into her new career as a children's writer. She had previously worked as a human rights campaigner for PEN for 20 years. The packages will also include maths games and stationery items, and if they prove successful will be rolled out across the UK by 2011. The initiative, Letterbox Club Green, is a partnership between books charity Booktrust's Letterbox Club, which offers a similar service to seven to 11 year olds, and the Siobhan Dowd Trust. Letterbox Club programme manager Marian Keen-Downs said the funding gave the project "enormous scope to develop parcels for older children and is a huge endorsement of the programme". "[It] perfectly meets the aims that Siobhan set out for the trust of giving disadvantaged young readers access to books, the opportunity to experience the joy of reading and develop their literacy to safeguard their future," she said. Keen-Downs selected the books for the project with a panel that also included author Steve Voake, librarian Claire Harris and Guardian journalist Lucy Mangan.