Evergreen Reads is a community-wide event sponsored jointly by District 124 and the Evergreen Public Library. The goal of Evergreen Reads is to bring voices across the entire village together to learn from, and about one another in a fun and unique way. “The objective is to get the entire community to share the experience of reading and discussing the same book, kind of like a village-wide book club,” said D124 superintendent Dr. Robert Machak. The novel the Evergreen Reads planning committee has selected for its inaugural event is Richard Peck's A Long Way from Chicago, a Newbery Honor book and National Book Award Finalist. The novel details the adventures of a brother and sister who leave the Windy City each summer to visit their grandmother in a small Illinois farm town during the Depression. “It’s a story that’s enjoyable to read on many different levels,” said Machak, “which is really why we selected it - its appeal spans age groups and demographics.
The library and school district have planned a number of Evergreen Reads events in March in conjunction with themes of the story.
Video Chapter Summaries:
Chapter 1: Shotgun Cheatham's Last Night Above Ground