The Reading Solution: Making Your Child a Reader for Life

Kelly L. Green is the co-editor of the Children’s Literature edition
of the Canadian Book Review Annual.

With The Reading Solution, Paul Kropp, a well-known writer of
high-interest, low-vocabulary young-adult fiction, has produced a
remarkable, accessible book with ramifications far beyond the claims of
his subtitle. This book is not simply a guidebook to creating a love of
reading in children; it is a study of literacy in what is threatening to
become a postliterate society, a clarion call to readers young and old,
parents, educators, librarians, journalists, and publishers.

Kropp devotes chapters to the parental role in literacy development, to
the various stages of reading progression, and to complicated problems
plaguing the adult reader, the gifted reader, the bored reader, and the
reluctant reader. The book has wide margins, most of which contain
sidebar information in the form of interesting quotations, statistics,
resources, tips, and definitions.

A Canadian writer himself, Kropp includes a wealth of information on
Canadian authors and children’s books (though he does not limit
himself to Canadian resources). The book’s commonsense approach, based
on hard research, and including plenty of information with practical
applications, makes it an invaluable resource for parents, teachers, and
all other interested parties.