Where are the Totally Ninja Raccoons?

Don't forget to check behind doors or under tables or besides the counter. You never know where some totally ninja raccoons will jump out at you. Find all 17 posters, bring your passport back to Amy's bookcase and enter to win a special prize. Don't forget to pick up a new favorite summer read while you're in the shop or a copy of the book that started "The Ninja Raccoons on Their Journey." You're watching the Local News Network brought to you by Pops Truck and RV Center and the Big Idea at San Juan College. I'm Hayley Opsal.

We have the totally ninja raccoons so this is a fun story. You can do all kinds of things on Facebook and I joined a group on Facebook called Indie Booksellers and that is for people who are independent booksellers. So in this group, I've made a lot of good friends who are independent booksellers. And one of them is Kevin Coolidge, who's the author of the "Totally Ninja Raccoons." And it's a set of nine books so far for young readers who sometimes struggle a little bit with reading. And he wanted to do a shop local program for his community in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania. And so his bookstore from my shelf books and gifts set up a shop where the "Totally Ninja Raccoons" hunt. And so he did it one year. And then he said anybody of his bookselling friends who wanted to join him were welcome to do so. So we did that last year. And so we had "The Totally Ninja Raccoon" posters all over Farmington. And people had a really great time with the hunt.

The game has a bit of a "Where's Waldo" feel. Only instead of searching for a guy wearing a red and white striped shirt, you're keeping an eye out for three ninja raccoons. Posters are created based on the book series. So each poster is unique and different. 17 local businesses are participating in this year's Totally Ninja Raccoon Hunt, denoted by a sign in their window. You can pick up a passport with all 17 locations at any of the spots, and the goal is to find all the posters and receive a stamp for each spot.

We do try to get and we really wanted to focus on the very small businesses and then the city partners with us too, to help us out. And so we we try to help them like Riverside and E3 were closed for so long with COVID. So we wanted to try to get families back into those places.

Another goal for Henkenius is to help reintroduce a love of reading among all ages. After all, in order to collect all the stamps. You do have to stop by Amy's bookcase at least once. And with over 100,000 books of every genre. You'll probably find something you like. The book series "Totally Ninja Raccoons" was created in part to encourage children to read books with the colorful illustrations and engaging stories. So a great place to start would be picking up the first of the series at the bookcase. Of course, one of the best parts of the whole exercise for Henkenius is seeing all the children who have participated so far this month.

But we love to see the kids come in. They are so enthusiastic. We just had a couple of them who finished all 17 places. So they dropped off their passports earlier and they were so excited because they had saved us for the last. And they were looking for the posters and they were like, "Come here, come here. I found one. Come here, come here. I found one." And they were happy to just look for things 'cause kids love to look for things.

You still have time to find your totally ninja raccoons this month, so make sure to stop by Amy's bookcase or any of the 17 other businesses to get your passport and go raccoon hunting. The event will go until July 31st and then Henkenius will announce the winners. To follow updates on those tricky raccoons or see what other events are happening at Amy's bookcase, make sure to follow it on Facebook. Thank you for watching this edition of the Local News Network. I'm Hayley Opsal.

‍