Cinema treat for Zyien after a library hunt

Young Zyien Thomas was the prize winner in the Great Mythical Fleetwood Hunt at the town's library.

Getting youngsters to take an interest in books isn't always easy these days but they've just hunted down a fun idea at Fleetwood.

The branch on North Albert Street staged a Great Mythical Fleetwood Hunt which involved hiding 13 knitted book characters in high streets shops for youngsters to track down.

There were knights and dragons, a woolly Lancashire witch and even a vampire lurking among the shop shelves.

By finding the colourful critters and filling out all of the parts in the special forms provided, the children were entered into a prize draw for the chance to win a £20 voucher for the Vue cinema in Cleveleys.

The lucky winner of the competition was six year old Zyien Thomas, an avid reader who has already taken part in many reading initiatives at the library.

The fun scheme, which began in August and finished last week, was part of the county-wide Lancashire Reading Journey to make sure youngsters’ reading levels didn’t drop over the summer holidays. Ian Williams, assistant branch manager at Fleetwood, said the scheme had proved a big success and helped encourage youngsters to take an interest in books and fun literary characters.

He said: “We were really pleased with the response to our Fleetwood event - we had 41 people involved, including children, mums and dads and grandparents.

“A big part of the Lancashire Reading Journey is obviously about reading books, as well as visiting a museum and going to a different library than the local one.

“The mythical Fleetwood Hunt was great fun and it’s always rewarding to see children enjoy themselves with book-related activities.”

Zyien, a pupil at St Mary’s Catholic Primary School on London Street, said: “It was really good, I liked trying to find the characters.”

Mum Karen Thomas, of Preston Street, said Zyien - one of three children - didn’t need much persuading to take an interest in books.

She said: “He’s always loved booked and he probably prefers books to toys. He’s already finished one of the library’s 50-book challenges and received his gold award and he enjoyed it so much he started a second one.

“The mythical Hunt was so good he hopes the library can do another one.”

She added: “It worries me that with all this technology these days, children won’t get into the magic of reading books, so this scheme was really good.

“It’s just a shame that some of our library branches are closing because of the cut-backs - we’re glad Fleetwood is staying open.”