--- title: McDonald's to Serve Happy Meals With Books Instead of Toys description: Now through February 15 canonical: https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-02-03T19:00:34.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:47:44.370Z og:title: McDonald's Will Serve Happy Meals With Books Instead of Toys og:description: Now through Feb. 15 og:url: https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt368a8a835a3e9ea0/69887c020a4a2288449c8371/gettyimages-508078262.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4000 og:image:height: 2250 og:image:alt: McDonald's Offers Japan Chocolate Fries While It Mulls Unit Sale og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: McDonald's Will Serve Happy Meals With Books Instead of Toys twitter:description: Now through Feb. 15 twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt368a8a835a3e9ea0/69887c020a4a2288449c8371/gettyimages-508078262.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # McDonald's Will Serve Happy Meals With Books Instead of Toys > Sponsored content. 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The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ## Video: Should I Eat French Fries? [Watch (HLS stream): Should I Eat French Fries?](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/kL7utfHP.m3u8) (2:30)  _Published 2015-06-10. A record number of experts weighed in on this one, and regretfully, 7 out of the total 9 give French fries a firm thumbs down._ by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Feb 3, 2016 7:00 PM UTC  An illuminated sign stands outside a McDonald's restaurant, operated by McDonald's Holdings Co. Japan Ltd., in Tokyo, Japan, on Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2016\. In an effort to win back customers after a series of food scandals, including a human tooth in a serving of french fries, McDonalds Japan has come up with a surprise; white-and dark chocolate-covered french fries. Photographer: Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg via Getty Images An illuminated sign stands outside a McDonald's restaurant, operated by McDonald's Holdings Co. Japan Ltd., in Tokyo, Japan, on Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2016\. In an effort to win back customers after a series of food scandals, including a human tooth in a serving of french fries, McDonalds Japan has come up with a surprise; white-and dark chocolate-covered french fries. Photographer: Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesKiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg via Getty Images by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Feb 3, 2016 7:00 PM UTC Trying to get your kids to read more? You might want to take them to McDonald’s, where they’ll get a book instead of a toy in their Happy Meals, now through Feb. 15\. Fair warning: you might want to tell them in advance, because they just might throw a fit when they find a paperback instead of a shiny plastic toy. According to[ the Los Angeles _Times_,](http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-mcdonalds-happy-meals-books-20160201-story.html) McDonald’s is including four different books in this experiment. Three of them are Valentine’s Day themed: _Clark the Shark Takes Heart_ by Bruce Hale and illustrated by Guy Francis, _Happy Valentine’s Day, Mouse!_ by Laura Numeroff and Felicia Bond, and _Pete the Cat: Valentine’s Day Is Cool_ by Kimberly and James Dean. The fourth book is the classic [_Paddington_](http://time.com/3667559/paddington-bear-trivia/) by Michael Bond and illustrated by R. W. Alley. This is the third time the fast food chain has served miniature paperbacks instead of plastic toys in its Happy Meals. By the time this year’s giveaway is over, McDonald’s will have distributed 50 million children’s books. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/"},"headline":"McDonald's Will Serve Happy Meals With Books Instead of Toys","datePublished":"2016-02-03T19:00:34.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:47:44.370Z","description":"Now through Feb. 15","url":"https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Business topic"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt368a8a835a3e9ea0/69887c020a4a2288449c8371/gettyimages-508078262.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt368a8a835a3e9ea0/69887c020a4a2288449c8371/gettyimages-508078262.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"McDonald's Offers Japan Chocolate Fries While It Mulls Unit Sale","caption":"McDonald's Offers Japan Chocolate Fries While It Mulls Unit Sale","creditText":"Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg via Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/","name":"McDonald's Will Serve Happy Meals With Books Instead of Toys"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Should I Eat French Fries?","description":"A record number of experts weighed in on this one, and regretfully, 7 out of the total 9 give French fries a firm thumbs down.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/kL7utfHP/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2015-06-10T22:49:27.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/kL7utfHP.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/","duration":"PT2M30S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4206461/mcdonalds-happy-meals-books/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```