'' Quick Reads'' is a series of short books by bestselling authors and celebrities. With no more than 200 pages, they are designed to encourage adults who do not read often or find reading difficult to discover the joy of books.
Quick Reads are a collaboration among publishers, supermarkets, bookshops, libraries, government departments, the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (
NIACE),
Arts Council England, the
BBC,
World Book Day, National Book Tokens and more. They are used as a resource for
adult literacy teaching and have been used in
Skills for Life and
ESOL classes in colleges, community centres, libraries, prisons and workplaces. They have also been used in hospitals, stroke recovery units, dyslexia centres, care homes, family learning groups, pre-schools, organisations working with homeless people and traveller communities, and Army and RAF bases.
In 2018, the program was due to end because of a lack of funding.
Jojo Moyes offered the group an additional three years of funding.
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History
Quick Reads were launched in the UK and Ireland by the then Prime Minister Tony Blair on World Book Day 2006. Through mid-2020, over 100 titles have been published, over 4.8 million copies have been sold and over 5 million copies have been loaned through libraries.[The Reading Agency, retrieved September 10, 2020]
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Featured authors have included Gordon Ramsay, Chris Ryan, Danny Wallace, Andy McNab, Ricky Tomlinson, John Simpson, Colin Jackson, Scott Quinnell, Adele Parks, Kerry Katona, Minette Walters, Joanna Trollope, Alvin Hall, and Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris (30 March 1930 – 10 May 2023) was an Australian musician, television personality, painter, and actor. He used a variety of instruments in his performances, notably the didgeridoo and the Stylophone, and is credited with the inventi ...
. The initiative also features seven books based on the popular '' Doctor Who'' series. An incomplete list of titles can be found on the Quick Reads website.
Sale
Quick Reads are available from supermarkets, bookshops and online retailers for £1.99. They can also be ordered direct from publishers and wholesalers.
There are special offers for employers and for family reading breakfast organisers, and in 2010 the new titles were available as eBooks for the first time.
Wales
The project in Wales
Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...
is also known as Quick Reads or Stori Sydyn in Welsh. Each year four books are published in Welsh, and four in English, by Welsh authors or celebrities. The campaign in Wales uses the same branding as the campaign in England, but it is bilingual. Funding for this comes from the Welsh National Assembly via Basic Skills Cymru, part of the National Basic Skills Strategy.
References
External links
Quick Reads Initiative websiteQuick Reads Initiative WalesBBC Skillswise for Quick Reads audio recordings and downloads
{{Authority control
British books
Programmes of the Government of the United Kingdom