About three years ago, while home for spring break, I was visiting the Lake Placid Public Library, as I usually do. This time I was asked by Children’s Librarian Karen Armstrong if I would like to join the committee for the newly formed Adirondack Family Book Festival. I agreed. At the time, I was placed on the board for the Youth Committee, though I had just turned twenty-one, so I was perhaps on the late side of the spectrum, depending on your idea of youth.
I started out as a volunteer, and now have a more hands-on role, including and not limited to giving presentations to members of the local Rotary Club. I genuinely enjoy the work because as a longtime student of literature, I believe in the power of books as well as the importance of education. In many unfortunate ways, both books and education have a difficult journey ahead of them. Books are being banned for featuring lives that are not considered appropriate for arbitrary reasons, and education is facing much the same challenges, creating more issues for teachers and educators that in general already have enough problems to overcome. All of this conflict disallows understanding, connection beyond difference, and hinders lasting beneficial change.
Books are physically small objects, one doesn’t take up too much space unless it’s especially thick, but even then, the book won’t spill from the corner of a desk. I own enough books to constitute a recognized library, but all together, they only take up one wall. One wall. The Lake Placid Public Library is a beautiful, but small library, taking barely any of the precious real estate on Mirror Lake. I’ve been to a few small town libraries, and a few big city ones. The Library of Congress, the biggest library in the world, holds more than 38 million books. The Madison building is 1.5 million square feet. That’s pretty big. 38 million books in 1.5 million square feet. The population of Poland is more than 38,539,201. Imagine every citizen of Poland in the Library of Congress. Books do not move, they do not eat, they do not burp, or sleep, or fight, or think, they don’t carry precious, crying babies, they don’t wake up late and almost miss an important meeting, that’s the author’s job.
The Adirondack Family Book Festival has brought in authors from around the country, such as Jason Chin, an illustrator, who along with author Andrea Wang, won the Caldecott Medal and a Newbery Honor for their book Watercress. It is a story about the daughter of Chinese immigrants living in Ohio. They stop on the side of the road one day to pick watercress, a cabbage plant, and in the process, the main character learns about her parents’ past and her heritage.
The Adirondack Family Book Festival was founded in part by Kate Messner, who writes the acclaimed series History Smashers, which seeks to unveil the truths and smash myths around histories such as the Underground Railroad, the Salem Witch Trials, and the Mayflower. Lauren Tarshis, who is the best-selling author of the I Survived series, offers scientific and well-researched first-person narratives of the Battle of Gettysburg, Pearl Harbor, and Hurricane Katrina. We’ve had authors who write about rovers lost to space, trains, Lucille Ball, moths, and mythological spirits from South America called the Jumbee … Authors who have won numerous awards, accolades, and multiple members of multiple best seller lists.
The most important thing about our festival is our authors and their stories. Every year, we compile a list of authors with diverse backgrounds who write about diverse topics. This is in the hope that every summer, around the middle of August, children from the North Country and beyond can experience new worlds, step into the lives of people completely different from them, and grow, as we all wish, into compassionate and open-minded adults. Books are small objects, but the ideas within are not.
At our festival, our goal is to allow children to see positive representation. Protagonists that are from different countries, have different identities, love different people, and yet, are just going through regular, kid and young adult problems that we all face. Crushes, embarrassing parents, growing up, trying to fit in, trying to make space in the world. Protagonists that children can relate to, learn from, and see themselves in. Books are a great privilege, being able to hold a festival all about books, for children and young adults, that is an even greater one, organized by dedicated volunteers, a supportive community, numerous donors and sponsors, the Adirondack Family Book Festival puts this privilege to good use. Young people not only attend our festival, but also volunteer, introduce the authors, take photos, help with set up, and much more. We not only teach our growing members about the importance of diversity, but also the importance of service to others, and kindness no matter what.
I began my work with the festival as a twenty-one year-old, and now I am twenty-four, an even older youth. The upcoming festival this August will be our fourth. We have a great lineup of authors. Once again, I am very excited, I love the work, and I love the work because of our mission: to connect, understand, and educate. Our mission states, “The Adirondack Family Book Festival brings together an illustrious and richly diverse group of children’s and YA authors and illustrators under a big convening tent and several smaller tents to meet their readers of all ages, read aloud, and talk…”
Thank you, and we hope to see you there in August!
Find more information about the Adirondack Family Book Festival here.