After the Mat-Su Borough School Board

at their Wednesday meeting, orders for those books went through the roof at a local bookstore.

“We were getting five or six [calls] an hour,” said Mary Ann Cockle, owner of Fireside Books in Palmer.

Cockle said they ran out of copies of the books within hours. Many orders came from areas in the Mat-Su Borough, but not all of them.

“We've gotten questions from all over the state of Alaska, as well as California, Tennessee, other states,” she said.

Meanwhile, a different business owner in Palmer decided to encourage students to read the books. DanaLyn Dalrymple started a contest, five $100 prizes drawn from the names of students who could prove they read the books. That was her plan at least.

“Within 24 hours, I had about 50 people who were willing to make a donation for a prize,” Dalrymple said.

She added that if everyone follows through on their donations, the prize pool will be about $5000 instead. If that’s the case, she said, the prize structure will need to be adjusted.

“We’re going to get as many kids a prize as we can,” she said.

Cockle also said that she’s been in contact with Dalrymple to try and make sure any student that wants to participate in the contest is able to get the books. Dalrymple expects an official announcement about the contest details in the near future.