In Brief: January 27

Former NFL coach and author Tony Dungy and his wife and coauthor, Lauren, just wound up a tour for their new picture book, You Can Be a Friend (Little Simon Inspirations, Jan.), illustrated by Ron Mazellan, first in a planned series of inspirational picture books. Beginning with TV appearances on The Today Show, Hannity, and On the Record, the tour took the duo to schools and bookstores in the New York City area, Pittsburgh, Indianapolis, Tampa, and Minneapolis (here, the Dungys read to students at A Child’s Place Day School in East Elmhurst, N.Y.). During the tour, the Dungys announced the Dungy Family Foundation Reading Program, which aims to work with schools, libraries, community programs, and businesses to foster a love of reading in children.

The American Embassy School in New Delhi holds an annual Authors’ Week, and this year school librarian (and children’s book author) Monika Schroëder welcomed writers Peter Sís, John Coy, and J. Patrick Lewis to participate. Arriving in New Delhi earlier this month, the authors signed books at a pancake breakfast attended by 350 students and parents, then spent last week visiting classrooms at the school and discussing their writing processes. Seen here, l. to r., are Sís, Lewis, Schroëder, and Coy.

Author AJ Stern visited Politics and Prose in Washington, D.C., earlier this week to promote Frankly, Frannie: Funny Business (Grosset & Dunlap, Feb.), the fourth title in her middle-grade series that launched last year. In the latest installment, Frannie and her family travel to Orlando, where Frannie takes an interest in the business conference in their hotel. To promote the book, Stern is visiting schools in Ohio, D.C., Florida, North Carolina, and New York.