Hey you!
Yes, you! Have you ever had a pen pal? Have you ever written letters to a friend who lives over 14,000km away? Do you wish to confuse an American with s’s instead of z’s and extra u’s in your writing? Are any of these new experiences you want to partake in?!
Well, we’ve got just the thing for you!
We’ve teamed up a series of public libraries in Delaware, USA for a Pen Pal program! It’s a chance to make new friendships and learn about another person’s culture and life experiences.
From Tuesday 18th April – Sunday 14th May you can join the first round of the program, simply by filling out a sign-up form. This program is open to adults, teens and children over 5 years old. Parental permission and in-person signup is required for ages 5-15, so if you’re not 16 yet just grab a parent and drag them in to your local library. If you’re 16 or over you can sign-up via the online form below.
From there, we’ll pair you with a similar participant from Delaware – you’ll be notified via email of who your pen pal is and what their interests are. Then write your letter and bring it to the library – we’ll take care of the international postage and you’ll be notified when to pick up your pen pal’s response.
Begin meaningful conversations and experience the enduring joy of receiving snail-mail!
If you’d like some letter-writing inspiration, check out some of our favourite epistolary novels (yes, there’s a word that specifically means book-written-as-a-series-of-letters):
Ella Minnow Pea : a progressively lipogrammatic epistolary fable / Dunn, Mark
Set on the totally-real island of Nollop, birthplace of the author of that sentence about brown foxes and lazy dogs, the islanders decide to stop using letters of the alphabet when they fall off a statue adorned with the sentence. And since the story is told in letters between residents who also have to stop using certain letters when writing to each other… It’s a lot of fun! For the reader, at least.
Also available as an eBook.
Illuminae / Kaufman, Amie
This story is told through a series of interview transcripts, chat logs, video summaries, and other ephemera. Chat messages are basically letters, right?
The story itself is about two exes in the middle of a fleeing space fleet, an …interesting AI, and a deadly space-plague.
Also available as an eBook.
Dear Rachel Maddow : a novel / Kisner, Adrienne
Brynn writes emails to Rachel Maddow, and did actually get a reply! To the one she sent… But hey, at least she’s writing? As well as dealing with her ex-girlfriend, her brother’s death, passive mother and even worse step-mother… And we get to read all the unsent (and sent) emails Brynn writes.
To Night Owl from Dogfish / Sloan, Holly Goldberg
The story of two kids trying to get their parents back together. No, this isn’t The Parent Trap, this is two 12 year olds who were unhappy when their dads started dating, but who are even more unhappy when they break up. And they were sent to te same summer camp and then have to communicate by writing letters.
Laura Dean keeps breaking up with me / Tamaki, Mariko
Just like the title says, in this graphic novel Laura Dean keeps breaking up with Freddy. So Freddy writes to an advice columnist (and medium), who writes back.
Also available as an eBook.
Code name Verity / Wein, Elizabeth
This isn’t really letters between people, but I love this book so I’m including it. It does get pretty heavy though! One part told through a written confession to Nazi captors in 1943 occupied France, the other part told through scribbled diary entries in a flight journal, this book is gooood.
Also available as an eBook and Audiobook.
The Cecelia and Kate novels / Wrede, Patricia C.
Cecelia and Kate are cousins in magical Regency England. And they write letters and help solve magical mysteries and deal with nefarious magicians and one of them may get turned into a dog!
