The Center for the Book at the New Hampshire State Library will once again be participating in Letters About Literature, a writing contest for readers in grades 4 through 12 sponsored by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress in partnership with Target Stores.

To enter, students are asked to write a personal letter to an author, explaining how his or her work changed their view of the world or themselves. Young readers can select authors, living or dead, from any genre-fiction or nonfiction, contemporary or classic. A panel of New Hampshire judges will select the top essayists in the state in each of the three competition levels: Level I for children in grades 4 through 6; Level II for grades 7 and 8; and Level III, grades 9 through 12. State winners will advance to national competition and the first-place winner for New Hampshire at each competition level will receive a $100 cash prize. Six national winners will each receive an expenses-paid trip to the nation's capital to read their letters during the National Book Festival in the fall of 2007. In addition, the national winners will each receive a $500 Target gift card redeemable at any Target Store or target.com.

Deadline for entries is December 8, 2006. Complete contest guidelines, the required entry coupon, resources for teachers, a list of books that inspired last year's semi-finalist essays, and the winning New Hampshire essays from previous years are available on our web site at http://www.state.nh.us/nhsl/bookcenter/programs/letters.html

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Mary A. Russell, Director
NH Center for the Book at the NH State Library
20 Park Street Concord NH 03301-6314
603-271-2866        mrussell@library.state.nh.us    

http://www.state.nh.us/nhsl/bookcenter/index.html
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