A From Brett with love Initiative
Every book opens a door.
There is something magical about a story.
For a little while, an ordinary classroom becomes a forest, a castle, a faraway island, or a place where anything is possible. Children laugh together, wonder what will happen next, and delight in discovering new worlds through the pages of a book.
Sometimes that’s where it begins.
A child who never thought of themselves as a reader suddenly can’t wait to turn the next page. A story comes alive. Reading is no longer just something they learn to do—it becomes something they love.
Brett knew that feeling.
He loved being read to as a young child, and as he grew older, he became a voracious reader. Once Brett started a good book, he didn’t want to put it down. He eagerly made his way through series like Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, and Warriors. He especially enjoyed seeing how people expanded those worlds through fan fiction, imagining new adventures long after the original story had ended.
That spirit inspires Brett’s Book Club.
Stories spark imagination.
Imagination leads to discovery.
Discovery inspires growth.
As we grow, we spread our wings.
That’s the journey we hope every reader discovers.
Ready to join us for our September Book Club?
Our Current Endeavors
Spread Your Wings
Helping children discover the joy of reading.
We’re currently raising funds to bring Spread Your Wings into elementary school classrooms.
Every lifelong reader has a first favorite book.
For some, it was the story they asked to hear over and over again before they could read the words themselves. For others, it was the book they couldn’t wait to finish because they had to know what happened next.
Our hope is to help create moments like those.
Not every child falls in love with reading right away. Sometimes all it takes is the right story, shared at the right time, to spark imagination and open a door to discovery.
Because every child deserves the opportunity to discover not only the joy of reading, but also the confidence to grow, dream, and spread their wings.
Through Spread Your Wings, we’ll place meaningful books into classrooms and into the hands of children—stories that spark imagination, encourage discovery, and help young readers spread their wings.
Every participating classroom will receive:
- A picture book chosen to spark curiosity, conversation, and imagination – added to the classroom library and shared with the class.
- A copy of the same book for every student to take home and keep.
- Optional activities that encourage creativity, discussion, and discovery.
How the endeavor works
Participating classrooms simply agree to:
- Read the featured book with the class. Teachers are welcome to invite parents, grandparents, librarians, community members, or other special guests to share the reading experience.
- Complete one suggested activity—or create one of their own.
- Share a brief reflection about their students’ experience.
Those reflections will help us continue learning as Spread Your Wings grows.
Know a classroom where stories could spread their wings?
We’d love to hear about them. Parents, teachers, school staff, and others who know a classroom are invited to nominate one for a future Spread Your Wings experience.
As Spread Your Wings grows, so will the number of classrooms we’re able to reach. We hope one of them might be yours.
The Next Chapter
Growing together through stories, conversation, and community.
One of the best parts of reading isn’t reaching the last page.
It’s thinking and talking about the story afterward.
The questions.
The different perspectives.
The moments when someone notices something you completely missed.
Sometimes those conversations help us understand the book a little better.
More often, they help us understand ourselves—and each other—a little better.
Stories continue to spark imagination. Imagination leads to discovery. Discovery helps us keep growing long after we’ve closed the book.
That’s the kind of community we hope to build.
Whether you’ve loved books your entire life or you’re still waiting for one to capture your imagination, there’s a place for you here.
Together we’ll read stories that make us laugh, challenge us to think, encourage us to grow, and remind us that we’re never finished becoming who we’re meant to be.
Some books stay with us because of what happened on the page.
Others because of the conversations that followed.
All of them have the potential to help us spread our wings.
Like every endeavor within Brett’s Book Club, The Next Chapter will grow one story, one conversation, and one friendship at a time.
If you’d like to follow our journey, we’d love to have you join us through Notes from Brett with love.
Our First Book
The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World
Laura Imai Messina
Not long after Brett died, a book arrived from my Aunt Janet.
She had read The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World after her granddaughter, Abbie, died and had found it to be a beautiful, cathartic story. She thought I might find something in it, too.
So I read it.
And I loved it.
I found a beautiful story about the complexity and individuality of grief. About how differently we each experience it, and about the strange juxtaposition between grief and life. Life keeps moving forward. Grief does too—but not necessarily at the same speed, or in the same order, and certainly not on anyone else’s timetable.
The novel follows Yui, who lost her mother and young daughter in the devastating 2011 tsunami in Japan. Yui is fictional. The tsunami was not.
Neither is the garden she finds.
In that garden sits a disconnected telephone. People travel there to pick up the receiver and speak to someone they have lost. No telephone line carries their words. The wind does.
But people don’t only find the phone. They find themselves and one another.
That meeting of the real and the imagined drew me even further into Yui’s story.
When I finished the book, I knew it was a story I needed to share.
And now I get to.
Aunt Janet sent this book to me. Now I’m sharing it with you.
I hope you’ll read it with us.
Join the Conversation
There’s more than one way to be part of Brett’s Book Club. Choose the one that works best for you—or join us for more than one.
Book Club on Zoom
Wednesday, September 30, 2026
4:00 p.m. Eastern | 1:00 p.m. Pacific
We’ll gather on Zoom for a small-group conversation about The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World. We’re keeping this gathering to about 15–20 readers so everyone has a chance to be part of the conversation.
Join Us on Facebook Live
Saturday, October 3, 2026
We’ll continue the conversation with a more informal live gathering. Come listen, share your thoughts in the comments, or simply spend a little time with us.
Event time and details will be posted here September 23.
Join the Conversation on Notes
Can’t join us live—or simply have more to say? We’ll open a discussion on Notes from Brett with love where you can share your thoughts about the book, respond to others, or simply follow along with the conversation.
The discussion will open September 23. A link will be posted here.