East Lothian Reads
What are you reading?
Something big is coming in January 2026. We want everyone in our communities to be talking about what they’re reading.
And we’re not just talking about traditional books - it can be everything from comics, magazines and graphic novels to newspapers real or virtual, blogs and audio books.
Our library service has secured £16,000 funding from the Scottish Government’s Public Libraries Improvement Fund for this year-long reading for pleasure project.
While libraries will be at the heart of this new project, we’re focusing on our communities and looking for individuals to join us as ambassadors and for community groups to get involved.
What’s it called?
East Lothian Reads. Nice and simple and we hope you will be seeing our logo all over East Lothian next year.
Why are we doing this?
We want everyone to know that there are so many benefits to reading for pleasure. Lots of studies have shown that it not only helps our young people with their learning and attainment, it can also reduce stress levels for people of all ages. Compared to non-readers, regular readers are 86% more likely to report feeling a sense of belonging to their community, 58% are more likely to report feeling generally happy, 51% are more likely to report finding it easy to relax and 45% are more likely to report sleeping well. They are also 35% more likely to say they don’t feel lonely and 32% more likely say they don’t feel anxious or depressed.
Families understand how important it is for their children to learn to read but with less time and fewer resources, supporting them to do so can feel like something else to add to the long list of parenting activities to feel guilty about not having time to do. It takes a village to raise a child and we’re asking the whole East Lothian community to get behind us in supporting our children and young people discover the benefits of reading for pleasure and those participating will also reap the benefits. Reading regularly can improve wellbeing, increase empathy, reduce loneliness, and tackle poverty. Just 10 minutes a day can make a difference!
More detail
We’ll be making an official announcement at the end of this month but to give you a preview, we’ll be holding events in communities for adults, children and young people, in each of the area partnership localities. These events where possible will not take place in libraries - this campaign is designed to appeal to those who are less likely to be engaged in reading already.
A panel will choose three collections of books across the year with multiple copies of each book available for loan in libraries and through our eBook and eAudiobook platforms.
We’ll be supporting interested services, groups and organisations to get involved with resources available if required. We’ll be inviting members of the public and partners to join us at a couple of events learning how we choose the books available for loan in our libraries and involving them in the process to help ensure our stock reflects our local communities. We’ll be working with school classes to involve them in redesigning library class visits.
Our ask of you
We have a number of working groups led by members of our libraries team and would like to invite anyone who would be interested in bringing your knowledge and experience to join us either in a working group or as a participant in the project. The groups will meet on Teams, attendance is not required at each meeting, but any input would be very much valued.
- planning and organising events - our experience is in appealing to readers, your perspective would support us to think more widely about what might appeal to your communities and clients
- selecting books for the collections - we want these collections to have as wide an appeal as possible, and potentially be available outside of libraries - could you help with this?
- engaging with partners - you know your communities and clients well and could help us engage with those less likely to use libraries to find out how we can best support them
- designing toolkit activities - we’d love your ideas on how to ensure our toolkit activities are simple to use and have the potential to engage as wide an audience as possible - are there ways we can support you with resources to participate in your own spaces or with your clients? Can you help us evaluate them?
- promoting the campaign - with your knowledge of your local community and clients, could you be reading ambassadors or identify others to do this, helping spread the word, encourage reading conversations and get East Lothian reading
We’re working with the literacy strategy leadership group to evaluate whether the project has influenced attainment and will be measuring community involvement through qualitative and quantitative measures looking at levels of interest and engagement at the beginning, end and throughout the campaign.
Our aim is that you’ll see the East Lothian Reads logo across the county over the coming year from our launch towards the end of January onwards. If you’re interested in the project and would like to get involved in any capacity then please contact us at libraries@eastlothian.gov.uk or speak to a member of staff in your local library.