“Where are your Star Wars books?” This is a very popular question librarians receive from children and their caregivers at the library. When a 5-year-old asks this question, I can’t help but smile and wonder if they have ever seen any clips of the first George Lucas Star Wars film from 1977. The reason children love Star Wars, whether it's from the different animated series, going to Disneyland, toys or film franchises are because the story and characters occur in “a galaxy far far away.” Who doesn’t want to have adventures with friends and lightsabers with the goal of saving the galaxy?
So, when a librarian receives the question, “Where are your Star Wars books?” we say they can be found in multiple locations in the library. The non-fiction arts section, the graphic novel section, where you can find Star Wars comic books, or the independent readers, where you can find beginning leveled Star Wars books. But there are more Star Wars inspired books and series that caregivers and their children can both enjoy together. The popularity of Star Wars spans generations and people want to share their love of Star Wars with each other.
If your child is learning how to code, there is a new Star Wars Coding Project book by Jon Woodcock with a step-by-step guide to coding using the free beginner coding language, Scratch. You can download the app and start coding fun Star Wars inspired projects together. There are picture books, especially the recent Chewie and the Porgs by Kevin Shinick that is adorable. My personal favorite author for Star Wars inspired books is Jeffrey Brown. I have read his Darth Vader and Son and other books in the series multiple times and still laugh out loud, and his Jedi Academy series is very popular at the library. The Origami Yoda series and the Star Wars retellings of the first three original movies from popular children authors such as Adam Gidwitz make great read alouds with your older children.
Have fun reading galaxies of stories, and happy Star Wars Day; May the 4th be with you!