Wonderful news: When My Name Was Keoko has been named an Honor Book by the Jane Addams Children's Book Award committee! This award is given to recognize books that "promote the cause of peace, social justice and world community." The 2003 winner is Parvana's Journey, by Deborah Ellis, and the other fiction Honor book is The Same Stuff as Stars, by Katherine Paterson. I am so honored and thrilled by this recognition.

More on the Jane Addams award

Announcing (drum roll, please...) the publication of PERIOD PIECES:
Stories for Girls (HarperCollins).

This is an anthology of short stories written by several authors and edited by Erzsi Deak and Kristin Embry Litchman. Each story is fiction or memoir about a girl's first period! I was delighted when Kris and Erzsi invited me to submit a story, and enjoyed working on it with them and with editor Rosemary Brosnan at HarperCollins, but best of all is seeing my story in book form alongside wonderful stories by other authors! For more information about the book, click on the cover image.

Fourth grade students at Jefferson School in Ottawa, Illinois, spent
almost the whole year studying my books! It was a great thrill for me to
meet some of these students, teacher Becky Nett, and librarian Connie Fultz last month during my tour. A big thank-you to author and friend Julia Durango, who helped set up the whole project: Click here to read the report on her website, and while you're there have a good look around--it's a terrific site!

Recent travels:

--to San Diego, for a great visit to LaJolla Country Day School

With LaJolla Country Day student Sam Brink--great-grandson of
author Carol Ryrie Brink, who wrote Caddie Woodlawn

--Los Angeles, for presentations at the awesome Central Branch of the LA Public Library, and the Pio Pico branch in Koreatown

With supporters and community members of the Pio Pico branch of the Los Angeles Public Library.

--San Francisco: presentations and signings at Kepler's in Mountain View; Book Passage in Corte Madera; Rakestraw Books in Danville; and Hicklebee's in San Jose

--Seattle: University Books; ParkPlace Books; and The Secret Garden

--Cobbles School in Penfield, NY

--Columbia, MD Public Library

--Baltimore: visits to Roland Park Country Day School; Bryn Mawr School; and the Calvert School, as well as a signing at The Children's Bookstore under the aegis of wonderful owner Joanne Fruchtmann.

With students at Roland Park Country Day School in Baltimore.

--Tour to promote the paperback edition of A Single Shard! Schools and
bookstores in Kansas, Missouri, Chicago, Milwaukee, Louisville, Cincinnati, Dayton, Washington DC, and Maryland! It was a wonderful trip, busy and hectic, and a BLAST meeting so many readers and book lovers!

With Random House publicist and miracle-tour-arranger Amy
Ehrenreich at the Barnes & Noble in Bethesda, MD.

--District 203 in Naperville, IL and Indiana Elementary School in Park
Forest, IL--MY old elementary school!

The last couple of months have been frantically busy, but after almost a
year and a half of near-continual travel, I'm going to be taking a break to stay home and see if I can remember how to write. Hopefully I'll be able to spend a little more time on the site during the summer months, so please come by again soon! Happy reading and writing to all--Linda Sue.

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