By Georgie Quinn | 5 May 2026
Suffolk Community Libraries is launching the theme of this year’s Căutare de lectură summer literacy campaign and an appeal for volunteers.
Reading Quest is the biggest literacy campaign for children in Suffolk. Run by the library service, it’s a fun and free summer reading programme open to all ages and all reading abilities.
This year, Reading Quest will have the theme of ‘Curious Creatures’ with some wonderful illustrations featuring animal detectives created by local illustrator and author Matt Robertson. The Curious Creatures crew features a polar bear, pig, raccoon, tortoise, fox and pigeon.
Matt Robertson said:
“I was thrilled when asked to illustrate the characters for this year’s Reading Quest with Suffolk Community Libraries. As children across the county dive into the challenge, I wanted to use a team of detective animals to help them on their way to complete the many reading quests.
“It felt important to include some familiar local wildlife found in and around Suffolk, alongside a few more unusual animals that have also made the county their home. I hope these playful characters not only support children on their reading journey, but also spark curiosity, imagination, and a lifelong love of books.”
Reading Quest will run during the summer school holidays with the aim of helping primary school children maintain their literacy levels and reading skills over the long summer break.
The idea is to make reading fun with a special free reading passport with space for tracking books children have read, as well as stickers and activities families can complete together.
Ahead of the launch, children aged 5 to 15 can also enter a short story competition inspired by the Curious Creatures characters.
This year is the National Year of Reading and to ensure it’s a big success, Suffolk Community Libraries has already started the search for volunteers to support Reading Quest. Volunteers play a huge part in supporting library staff by spending time listening to children talking about their quest.
Erin Hamilton, Suffolk Community Libraries Early Literacy and Youth Engagement Lead, said:
“As this is the National Year of Reading, we’d love for Reading Quest to make a real impact this year! Thanks to Matt Robertson we have a fun and colourful group of Curious Creatures on board and now we need a team of volunteers to help us!
“We start the appeal at this time of year as we have so many to recruit and it helps us to get everything ready for the summer. It’s so rewarding and we’d love to hear from anyone who’d like to help!”
Anyone over 12 can volunteer and it’s a great way of helping the community, getting experience of working with children and meeting new people. Volunteers need to commit to spending 3-4 hours per week helping in the library for a minimum of six weeks over the summer holidays.
You can find out more and apply to be a volunteer on the Suffolk Community Libraries volunteering pages.
The deadline for volunteer applications is 17 June to allow for the necessary applications to be checked and processed in time.
There will be full information about Căutare de lectură in the summer.
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