Fundraising for the Children's Reading Fund

The Children's Reading Fund has attracted businesses, corporates and people from all walks of life to get involved with raising money. We've had celebrated authors like Neil Gaiman get involved through Audible, we've had charity auctions and more. Here's a flavour of some of the fundraising activities going on around the Fund.

Neil Gaiman and Audible

Audible raised over £5,300 for the Fund in October last year by donating 50 pence for every download of a new Neil Gaiman story written specially for Halloween. 'I started All Hallow’s Read two Halloweens ago as a way to encourage more people to give each other books—in this case, scary books,' said Gaiman. 'Recording this new story and giving it away free at Audible seemed like a great way to extend that concept even further, with Audible’s help, by supporting the important efforts of Booktrust and DonorsChoose.org on behalf of education and literacy.'

Charity Auctions

Over £12,000 was raised in the Fund's first charity auction in January run by Richard Fattorini, Director of Books and Manuscripts at Sotheby's and hosted by Joanna Trollope and Lemn Sissay (see pic, left). Lots included a very special afternoon visiting the Dutch collection at the National Gallery with Tracy Chevalier, author of Girl with a Pearl Earring. 

The two highest lots were donating a collection of 500 children's books to a school, hospital or other organisation of your choice, which went for £4,000 and the chance to be immortalised in a James Patterson novel, which raised £3,500. We have a number of similar prizes donated by authors, illustrators and supporters so do contact the fundraising team if you are holding an event where we could auction some prizes to raise money for the Fund.

W S Law support children in care in Southwark

London Bridge law firm W S Law have donated money to support five children in care from the London Borough of Southwark. The partnership includes linking the law firm with a local school with volunteers reading to school classes during lunchtimes.

The Book Exchange

The Book Exchange, who previously supported Dyslexia Research Trust have adopted the Children's Reading Fund as their new charity partner for 2013 and will be donating 20p for every book traded in through their recycled readers exchange scheme this year so that members can help create a world where even the most disadvantaged children in the UK can benefit and share the joys of reading a good book this year and beyond.

The pride of Penguin

This year's Penguin Charity Walk will be raising funds for The Children's Reading Fund. The theme for this year's walk, taking place on 14 June, will be 'The Pride of Penguin'. It will focus on promoting awareness of literacy, with each walker giving away a children's book along the way. The walk will take walkers through areas of London famed for their literary links. This will include the house where J M Barrie wrote Peter Pan and Buckingham Palace, which features in a Peppa Pig book where she meets the Queen. Planned activities also include author events at local schools and fun activities for all ages.