I had so much fun last week visiting with students throughout New England. My first stop was at Boston Collegiate Charter School. For the second year in a row, 5th grade readers read A Girl Called Problem and then invited me down to share stories and pictures from my time in Tanzania. The students had so many great questions and comments about the book. It was readily apparent that they had spent two whole months carefully reading and studying A Girl Called Problem. Here are some vocabulary words from the novel posted on their classroom wall:

The next day I was up in Boston for a day of talking with students at Cape Elizabeth Middle School. Seventh graders there will soon be launching into their study of Africa, so it was fun to talk about Tanzania’s post colonial history, which is the backdrop for A Girl Called Problem.

The next day I attended the Cape Authorfest, where I enjoyed more time to visit with students and some fabulous writers. Here I am with Megan Frazer Blakemore (author of The Water Castle among other great books), Terry Farish (The Good Braider and others), agent Edite Kroll, Padma Venkatraman (Climbing the Stairs, etc.), and Maria Padian (Out of Nowhere and the soon-to-be-released Wrecked, which I can’t wait to read). Fun!

Thanks so much to the fabulous Ms. JB at Boston Collegiate Charter School, Amanda Kozaka at Cape Elizabeth Middle School, and Travis Nadeau and all of the other organizers of the Cape Authorfest for hosting me! It was great to reconnect with readers and writers.