“While I didn’t have many books as a child, the experience of reading the funny pages in the newspaper while sitting on my father’s lap has stayed with me over the years. This closeness with my father impressed upon me that he loved me and cared about me and that our time together, reading or walking in the woods looking at insects underneath the peeled away bark of a tree, mattered a great deal to him. Sharing books together can provide such important moments for children and their parents or caregivers.” Eric Carle

“The first book that changed my literate life was actually published as an adult book, but my mother had the insight and wisdom to read it aloud to me when I was eight years old. I still remember the sound of her voice, the shape of her shoulders as she held the thick hard-cover book, and the hall light illuminating her as she sat in the hallway and read to me and my sister, each in our bedrooms. The book was The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.”
Lois Lowry
Author of The Giver and Number the Stars

“I got hooked on books because my parents read bedtime stories to us from The Children’s Hour, a 16-volume collection of short stories. I loved Volume 13: Roads to Adventure. The children’s book that got me hooked on writing for children is Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine — it perfectly captures the magic of being a kid.”
Wendelin Van Draanen
Author of Sammy Keyes and Shredderman

From firstbook.org