Suspicious Minds

I was chosen as a Book Giver for the newly launched World Book Night. I was asked to choose my favourite book out of 25 brilliant titles, and it was pretty hard. As most of you know I am a bit of a book worm and have been for many years. A good book is something I crave for, and when I find one (which is often), I feel like immersing myself into the world of fiction more than the time before. Each book creates its own place in my mind, and like that I fell in love with "One Day" by David Nicholls. It was a book I could relate to in some way, not entirely of course, but there were bits of the book that resonated with me. In fact, I have actually never felt the way I do about any book as I did with this. I loved the idea, I loved the story and I most definitely loved the characters. This is how I made my choice when it came to the World Book Night.

Once I was given the volunteer position to distribute this book for the World Book Night (5th March), I was very excited. I was allowed to share my love of books, and more importantly my love for this particular one with whomever I wished to. The point of this event was to spread the joy of reading by giving out one million books (25 titles were chosen) to the public. It was also to try and get a book as far across the globe as possible by passing the books on, once read. I decided to give out books at Euston Station and it took about an hour and a half to completely distribute 48 books. During this time I found that the British public in general are very suspicious people. Even though I had made a poster and wrote in bold that the books were free, they somehow did not believe me. Each person would look at me as though I was selling them a bad idea, or conning them into a Nigerian scam. And I had an ID badge to make things more legit.

About 60% of the public didn't believe it was for free, and when they did come up to find out what I was doing, they would take the book and say "what do I have to do to have this book? Where shall I sign/pay?" and I would have to reiterate that it was FREE. However, the rest of the public approached at the sound of that word and would take the book without asking questions. There were some very interested and some very lovely and happy people as well. I met other Book Givers and it was all very thrilling! I have to say I loved it - with the grumpiness of the people included.

It is very hard to gain trust from the British public, I have to say. They think everything is a conspiracy and everyone is out to get them. They seem to be in a constant rush in chasing someone or something.

Let's all slow down for a while and listen to some good music.