Books By The River, led by Catherine Acton, have sent us the following information about this year’s Totnes Book Hunt. We have published their article in full – should you want any further details about this event, please contact Books By The River using their contact details at the bottom of this page.
How will you be celebrating the National Year of Reading 2026?
We’re making the Totnes Summer Book Hunt even more special this year with hundreds of books being hidden around the town for our young people to find and enjoy!
With the support of local businesses, Books by the River, will be hiding hundreds of books in and around Totnes for children to find over the Summer Holidays. Catherine Acton, who runs Books by the River, is committed to supporting young readers and this reading initiative is set to continue that work by promoting reading over the summer break.
This year is the National Year of Reading and with that, brings an opportunity to bring reading for pleasure to the fore front for our young people. We hope that children and families will stumble across a book pack as they explore our wonderful town. Find it, keep it; Read it, enjoy it. Or if it is a book not suitable for your age range or you have already found a few, please consider leaving it for others to find or take it to share with friends or family members.
Year after year, we continue to see the impact we are having so please share a picture of your children reading the first page or showing us the front cover of the book they’ve found. These images are amazing and really help to share the buzz of the event across the town.
A huge thanks must go to our amazing sponsors who are recognised on each book they sponsor. We are very grateful for your support. These are: China Blue, Hays Travel, Cranch’s Sweetshop, Roly’s Fudge Totnes, Luscombe Maye, Visit Totnes, SMALL – FOLK, Rendells, Dartmouth Steam Railway and River Boat Company, Specsavers, Seymour Vets, Cllr Anne Presswell, Cllr Georgina Allen, Cllr John Birch, Baltic Wharf Boat Yard and TQ Print & Design – Thank you all so much!
To continue with our community work, this year, we will be holding a new event; a Children’s Bookswap and Puzzlemania. This will be happening at The Totnes Scouts Hut, Steamer Quay on Saturday 1st August, 10am-2pm. Share the love of reading and help us to give your old children’s books a new home! Bring one or two books that you would like to swap for another. There will also be jigsaws of all sizes laid out for all to enjoy completing throughout the day. We hope to see lots of families join us for some jigsaw fun, the children’s bookswap, colouring, magic painting and refreshments. Why not bring a packed lunch to enjoy afterwards at the Pirate Ship.
For more information about our events, or if your business or as individuals would like to support an initiative similar to this one by sponsoring books in your community, contact Catherine at Books by the River. You can also find us on Facebook and Instagram where you will be able to see all of the amazing things we get up to all year round as well as our work with schools as we support them in receiving new, valuable reading resources for their pupils.
Catherine Acton | 07515 643720 | booksbytheriver@hotmail.com