Useful Organisations No.22

E-mail: healthybooks@altavista.co.uk>

Website: www.healthybooks.org.uk

Healthy Books grew out of Elizabeth Schlenther’s experiences as both a hospital children’s ward librarian and a school librarian. To provide a list of children’s books which offer information and reassurance with health and emotional problems, together with characters acting as good role models, she originally published two bibliographies with the Health Libraries Group of the Library Association. To expand the usefulness of these listings, it was recently decided to transfer the project to the Internet. The website includes over 500 books in some 32 sections on such diverse subjects as adoption, bullying, divorce, death, and behavioural problems, as well as books on disability, both mental and physical, and many different medical conditions. The new on-line bibliography has Browse and Search functions and can be accessed through subject, author, title, publisher, or age level. The listing is intended for children up to age 12, and includes both information and fiction books – fully annotated and assessed – and is continually updated. It should be useful for parents, teachers, health and social services and all those interested in the broad aspects of children’s emotional and physical health.