A Volunteer-Reader’s Anniversary
Seven years ago this week, I began volunteering at the CNIB Recording Studio in Toronto – reading books and teching for others who are reading. In addition to magazine articles and chunks of various textbooks, (and the foreword to a book being read by a male narrator), I have read a wide range of books – for kids, teens and adults, and fiction, non-fiction, and poetry.
I blogged about one of those books last year, and then, because it was unique to my experience at CNIB, I blogged about it again.
This month I started reading my 23rd book: Wicked Girls: A Novel of the Salem Witch Trials by Stephanie Hemphill. Like Ragged Company, its story is told from multiple viewpoints, but this time the voices will all be mine, and this one is narrated in verse.
As an avid reader, it’s satisfying to know I’m helping make books available to those living with vision loss. It’s a lot of work to prepare a book for reading aloud, but the whole process, whether reading or teching, is also a lot of fun.
Others volunteer for CNIB in other ways, across the country. It’s fascinating to read about the impact of some of those individuals working behind the scenes to provide vision support services.
In this 10th International Year of the Volunteer, is there some way you enjoy making a difference in some small corner of your world?
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Kathy Stinson is the author of the classic Red Is Best and the award-winning The Man with the Violin. Her wide range of titles includes picture books, non-fiction, young adult fiction, historical fiction, horror, biography, series books, and short stories. She has met with her readers in every province and territory of Canada, in the United States, Britain, Liberia, and Korea. She lives in a small town in Ontario.
It was fun to snoop through some of the book covers on your cnib reading shelf. I remembered most of them individually but its interesting to see them again collected all together – from pets to poetry to cookbookery 🙂
Yes, i've been lucky to enjoy such a range of reading material. And to think it all started when you conducted my audition 7+ years ago! Thanks for all your help with these books since! (And thanks for visiting my blog.)