Suffolk's favourite children's book revealed!

Suffolk Libraries has announced the top ten favourite children’s books in Suffolk, as voted for by the county’s library users.

The winner was the ever-popular The Gruffalo, by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler, which celebrated its 20th anniversary this year and has sold over 13.5 million copies worldwide.

The Gruffalo was also recently declared the UK’s third best bedtime book, behind Goodnight Moon, by Margaret Wise Brown and Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak in a list by Happy Beds that came out on World Book Day this year.

It was also selected as the favourite children’s book of Ipswich County and Newmarket libraries as part of the Suffolk Libraries Children’s Month campaign earlier in the year.

Kate Ashton, manager of Newmarket Library, said: “We love this story because it has a great moral for children: it doesn’t matter how small or weak you seem to others, you can outsmart those bigger and stronger than you.

“The Gruffalo is a great story to read together; the phonics, the rhymes and the rhythm make it fun and easy for children to begin to read on their own, and you can really play with it to build the tension. Axel Scheffler’s illustrations mean there is something to enjoy on every page.”

Another of Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler’s books, Room on the Broom, came in fourth place in our survey, and was Leiston Library’s favourite children’s book.

We conducted the survey in April as part of Children’s Month. A total of 626 people across the county nominated their favourite children’s book through an online form. Both children and adults participated in the survey, many of them parents who read to their children. The results were then counted and the recurring entries totalled to determine the top ten: