Many congratulations to Perry Randall, the winner of the 2024 Canterbury Book Store Essay Contest with her persuasive argument on why we should carry Tui T. Sutherland’s Wings of Fire series. See below for a reproduction of her essay in full; rest assured, we will indeed be stocking this series. Special thanks to my aunt June, who not only sponsored the contest but also acted as judge and pored over each essay. She said she had a difficult time choosing the winner as all the entrants this year had strong and convincing submissions! My personal thanks to all the children who sent in a submission - it was a pleasure to read your essays and share in your joy of reading.
And now, the winning essay:
Wings of Fire Books
by Perry Randall
I think the specific series of books the Canterbury Book Store should carry in its store is the Wings of Fire book series. They are a kids fantasy fiction series about dragon prophecies and saving friends. The author is Tui T. Sutherland and the series is a New York Times bestseller. There are 16 books but you should at least carry the first 5 of this series. In this series the main characters are dragons, and humans are called “scavengers” and they are used for pets or food for the dragons. I love these books because they have adventures like, for instance, the good dragons fly across the Sandwing, Seawing, and Icewing territories to stop a war (these are different types of dragons) and make peace.
I like the author’s descriptions of how the different kinds of dragons look. For instance my favorite type is a Skywing because they are protective, strong, and pretty. My favorite characters in this series are Mono, Quibli, Cliff, and Peril. Of these, Cliff is the best. He is a Skywing dragonett, which is a little dragon less than ten years old. He is a funny character that loves to sing songs. He is also the prince of the Skywings. The chapters are written in a way that makes me feel excited and curious about what will happen next. I don’t want to stop reading once I start. The book I’m reading now (#14) is 316 pages, but it will only take about four days to finish it. I think the age of kids that will like these books are from 7 to 13. These books are very popular at my school library. I know kids will like to buy them if they are at the Canterbury Book Store.