Friends of Axe to hold Children's Book Festival March 31

The Friends of the Leonard H. Axe Library will hold its second annual Children’s Book Festival from 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, March 31 in the east lobby of the Weede Physical Education Building. Proceeds from the event are used to support a wide variety of projects for library improvement.

The Children’s Book Festival is held in conjunction with the annual Young Authors’ Conference. Authors from the United States, Australia and England have donated samples of their work for the festival. Most of them are signed and many are decorated with a small drawing or a note.

For example, Jeff Weigel, the author of the “Atomic Ace” comic book series not only gave two of his books for the festival, but also two very precisely drawn samples of his art work on the lining papers.

Other works in the festival include a number of picture books that appeal to youngsters such as “The Old Woman Who Lived in a Vinegar Bottle,” about a greedy old lady who gets a very nice wish from a fairy, but exasperates her benefactor by continually “trading up.” “A Sea of Words” is an ABC book about the deep blue sea with beautiful illustrations of clownfish, anglerfish, barracudas and other colorful denizens of the ocean.

There are also many wonderful books for middle school and high school readers, such as “Lorenzo and the Turncoat,” involving exciting adventure in colonial New Orleans at the time of the American Revolution, or “Bridging Beyond,” in which a troubled teenager dreams of a near-death experience. Comedies in the festival include works such as “Amelia Bedelia’s Family Album,” in which the world’s most literal maid introduces a gaggle of equally literal relatives. “Time Bomb,” tells the story of four misfit youngsters in 1949 London who find an unexploded bomb and keep it a secret, with disastrous results. Among the non fiction books is “Colonial America,” part of the “Making a New Nation” series, has beautiful period illustrations.

Since the organization’s creation in 1988, the Friends of Axe Library has planned and supported many projects for library improvement, including purchases of furniture, films and books, organization of numerous lectures and an art exhibition and publication of a guidebook about the history of the campus, which is now in its second edition.

Organizers of the Children’s Book Festival say that as an added incentive, the books for sale are not only signed, but discounted 25 percent.

For information about 2007 projects of the Friends of Axe Library, check the latest edition of their newsletter, “A Chat Between Friends,” at http://library/friends/newsletter/2007_spr_chat.pdf.

---Pitt State---