Resources for Libraries

Welcome, librarians!

We’re here to help you source international books for your collection, for all readers from 0-18 … and beyond, because we know that, really, children’s and YA books are for everyone!

We promote and review global books for young readers all year round, and especially in September which is #WorldKidLitMonth: the perfect time to explore the world through books.

Please contact us if there are any specific resources that would be useful to you and your community.

The resources you have created for World Kid Lit Month are excellent,
so comprehensive and interesting that I am sure that they will be
valuable to teachers and librarians.

Anne Thompson, Chair of the Surrey Branch of the School Library Association, UK

Celebrating World Kid Lit Month in your library

You may be surprised how many international books and books in translation you already have on your shelves for a World Kid Lit Month display.

Take a look at our Read the World resources for easy-to-use book lists, and you’ll find our bingo charts for reading ideas here and on this page: What is World Kid Lit Month?

If you have some wall space, you could create a display with a map of the world showing where various books, authors, illustrators and translators are from. A great way to visualize where we can travel with global literature!

Your library staff might feel inspired to team up and take the World Kid Lit team challenge! Set yourselves a group reading goal for the month, perhaps taking these bingo charts as an inspiration. You’ll find hundreds of reading ideas here on this site, responding to each of these categories.

World Kid Lit Month events in your library

For promoting international authors and world literature, the following types of events usually go down well with families:

  • interactive creative translation workshop, or multilingual creative writing workshop. We have lots of experience at running these here at World Kid Lit; please ask us for more info!
  • translation slam, or translator duel: two literary translators discuss their translations of a children’s text, perhaps a well-known classic, and the audience discovers more about the subjective craft of translation
  • Read the World treasure hunt: interactive activity for budding sleuths, discovering books from around the world and how we can travel by book

School libraries: New Reading Challenge Award!

The World Kid Lit Reading Challenge Award is a new prize for schools that run an innovative and globally inclusive reading challenge. The Award aims at encouraging young people to read for pleasure, to explore international perspectives and global citizenship, and through reading in translation, to see the value of a second language as a cultural and creative asset.

In 2025, the pilot year, the Award is open to schools anywhere in the world, as long as English is one of the school’s main teaching languages. The Award is open for entries in September, World Kid Lit Month. More details here.

What’s new from around the world?

One of the best ways to read global literature is through children’s and YA books in translation from other languages. Here at World Kid Lit blog, we publish a list each year of new releases so you can keep abreast of the latest new books in translation for your younger library visitors. You’ll find all the annual lists here, and the latest list is always pinned to the top of the blog on our home page. If you’re looking for bilingual books, take a look at this page.

Other great places to find international and translated books include:

Be a #WorldKidLit champion!

Please share book ideas and pictures of your international book displays on social media with the hashtags #worldkidlit all year round, and #worldkidlitmonth in September.

We would love to interview more librarians and teacher-librarians for World Kid Lit blog! Please tell us how you include international children’s books in your collection, which translated children’s and teen books have proven popular, and how your library celebrates #WorldKidLitMonth. Please get in touch or see here to find out more about contributing to the blog.