Gladys Hunt - Honey for a Childs Heart: The Imaginative Use of Books in Family Life

To Mark and Keith, with love and thanks for many happy hours of reading together

Dear Gladys Hunt,

My mother, a missionary to Chile with five children, is one of your most avid fans. The first edition of Honey for a Childs Heart was on our shelves at home and I frequently saw Mama concentrating on some nugget of wisdom or looking for a book in the bibliography. All I had to do was to ask for a book and she would recommend a wonderful book for me.

Then I grew up and left home. After college I realized how lost I was in libraries without my mother. Then you wrote your book for teens, a book that I have read and reread, both in order to find good books for myself, as well as to recommend them to others. I am a high school English teacher, fascinated by the world of books and eager to encourage others to enjoy all that books have to offer.

My focus changed recently when I discovered that my husband and I are expecting a baby. This monumental event is due to take place in April, and Ive discovered that I suddenly want to be PERFECT for this child. Since this goal probably wont be accomplished in a few months, I decided to set smaller ones dealing especially with passing on values and beliefs. One of the greatest things my parents have modeled for me has been a love of books. So I went out and bought Honey for a Childs Heart.

The experience of reading that book was like few others. That book in MY LIFE! I have seen it work. Everything you said about books and faith and the transmittal of values spoke Truth to me. I never knew all my mother had adopted from your book until now: reading Proverbs around the breakfast table, the question and answer time after a chapter of the Bible, and the reading aloud of excellent books, all of which my parents recognized as wise and practical ways to influence us kids. And now, as I start my own family, I yearn to be as influential in the lives of my children as my parents have been, thanks in great part to your incredible books.

My husband (who is in the process of becoming a reader) and I have had wonderful times reading aloud. Ive read aloud the Narnia books, The Bronze Bow, A Wrinkle in Time, The Robe, and others, and he has loved them.

Thank you for your part in making my life so rich and for your ministry in my family as I was growing up. It has borne fruit.

Sincerely, Jewel Kaste

I began writing about families reading books together at the suggestion of our teenage son who wanted me to share with others the fun our family had with books. He said that reading books together seemed to him one of the most important things about our family life. This encouraged me to begin organizing ideas for a book. Later 1 when he reminded me that Proverbs says, Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones (Proverbs 16:24), we came up with the title for this book.

The book ended up being a family venture with discussions about books at meals for weeks on end. Remember when we read and Dont forget to put this book in. Slips of paper were pulled out of jeans pockets or notebooks listing book titles remembered while in school. It was a tumble of memories every time books entered our discussionnot just the title of the book, but the plot, the characters, the remembering. I realized afresh what a rich treasure books have been in our family life. Honey, indeed!

Honey for a Childs Heart was the first of its kind. The publisher was wary about the idea of producing a book that promoted books from other publishers. He was open to my reasoning, and I credit him for taking the risk. My hesitant editor became enthusiastic when he saw that I was not only listing a wide variety of books, but also writing a philosophy of reading to widen the world of a child, to enhance family life, to introduce both children and parents to the best books. Who could have known the widespread impact of this book? Other books on this subject have followed, but this piece of honeycomb was the first of its kind.

This is the fourth revision of Honey for a Childs Heart. The book has been in print long enough to have its influence affect the second generation of children. I know the ideas in this book work, because I have seen the difference it has made in our own family, in our grandchildren, in my nieces and nephews, and in the many other children in our lives. Talking about books together has influenced their language usage, writing skills, imagination, and ability to analyze what they are reading. And almost nothing does more for family closeness than having a child read aloud some beautiful passage from a bookwords too wonderful not to share with people you love.

Its been an awesome experience to see how this book has affected the family life of others. Some years after the book had been in print, I was at a summer training program for university students when a winsome, lanky college student approached me as if he knew me. He began by thanking me for making his life so rich. As I wondered what I had unwittingly done, he recounted his family story. When he was a little boy his mother bought Honey for a Childs Heart shortly after its publication; she insisted his father read it, and together they made a pact to be a reading family. Ben recited a long list of titles, places, or vacations where his parents and his siblings had read stories. Our conversation became more and more animated as the list of books he mentioned grew longer and longer. It was as if we knew all the same people from the stories we had read. We felt like old friends, a very special connection between us. The encounter was a gift to me, because he is part of what this book is all about.

Many mothers and fathers have thanked me for helping us raise our children"which is a nice way to put it since I believe books are one of the important ingredients for good family life. But letters from the children of these parents are even dearer to me. What a wonderful lot of people share this love of books with their children!

Now Ive had the fun of revising and bringing Honey for a Childs Heart up-to-date again. This means I have books stacked everywhere, that I am always engrossed in a new one, and frequently read choice paragraphs to my husband and our grown children, showing them the imaginative illustrations that wonderfully illumine so many new books.

Many children and I share books, and I take seriously the recommendations they give me. A neighbor girl one time asked me if the piles of childrens books she saw stacked around the house were mine or belonged to someone else. When she found they were mine and I was reading them, she began stopping by to share her books with me. It isnt due at the library for three more days, she would say. Do you have time to read it? And you can bet that I did!

GLADYS HUNT