Eoin Colfer, one of Friday morning’s children’s book and author breakfast speakers, said it best during his freewheeling remarks, telling a packed ballroom of booksellers that he loves BookExpo, because it provides him with the opportunity to see old friends and meet young writers. “Such energy, creativity, talent, and absolutely raw passion,” he declared, “The future of children’s literature is in very good hands.”
The other breakfast speakers proved Colfer’s point, all of them speaking from the heart and emphasizing two themes: sisterhood is powerful and so are booksellers.
The morning’s hosts, Jenna Bush Hager and Barbara Pierce Bush, the twin daughters of George W. Bush and Laura Bush, introduced their new picture book, Sisters First (Little, Brown, Oct.), illustrated by Ramona Kaulitzki, to the booksellers by reminding them of the Bush sisters’ street cred with the book industry: they grew up with a mother who was a librarian who encouraged reading and creativity. “With my sister at my side, our imaginations ran wild,” Jenna said, disclosing that Sisters First originally was supposed to be published in 2017, but the sisters after the 2016 election collaborated instead on a memoir (for adult readers)—also entitled Sisters First, essays about their lives growing up in the public eye.
Expressing joy at having returned to writing the original Sisters First picture book, Barbara described it as a “love letter to each other about our extraordinary life,” as well as a celebration of the bonds between sisters that can empower siblings to do great things together. Jenna added, “We want girls to know, no matter who they are, where they come from, they can dream big.”
Tomi Ayedemi, whose second novel, Children of Virtue and Vengeance (Holt, Dec.) in her YA fantasy trilogy, the Legacy of Orisha, has been postponed for release a few times, reiterated the themes in the Bush siblings’ remarks: sisterhood is powerful, and people can do great things by doing them together. Disclosing how she often feels powerless in the face of all the evil that is going on in the world, Adeyemi pointed out that books “are the biggest tools to change the world” and make it a better place.
Readers “spend hundreds of pages inside someone else’s head,” she pointed out. “That can change people’s view of the world.” Adding that books are made into movies and television shows, and other forms of information, news and entertainment, Adeyemi noted that those who sell books “are some of the most powerful people” because they provide access to the books that can change the world.
Adeyemi’s childhood love of the movie The Parent Trap inspired her to start writing fan fiction that involved her and an identical (fictional) twin having the adventures she wanted to have in real life. Disclosing that she felt discouraged as a teenager because she did not see herself reflected in books, television shows, or in movies, Adeyemi drew applause when she uploaded a photo onto the large screen to the left of the stage of the morning’s next speaker, Lupita Nyong’o, taken at the 2014 Academy Awards when Nyong’o won the Oscar for best supporting actress for her role in 12 Years a Slave.
Noting the importance of people “getting to see themselves so that the world can see them,” and that booksellers play an essential role in that process, Adeyemi added, “That’s what [Nyong’o and black characters in books and entertainment media] did for me—and I want to do for others.”
Nyong’o, who immediately followed Adeyemi at the podium, had to take a few moments to compose herself after Adeyemi’s shout-out. Wiping her eyes, Nyong’o introduced her picture book, Sulwe (S&S, Oct.) illustrated by Vashti Harrison. Sulwe is about a dark-skinned girl’s journey towards self-love. “I wanted to hold up a mirror” for children with dark skin in a “colorist” society that values light skin over dark, she said, recalling that when she was growing up in Kenya, none of the golden-haired, blue-eyed characters in the classic children’s books she read looked even remotely like her. “There were no mirrors,” she said, “Mirrors enable us to have a have a sense of ourselves.” Writing Sulwe, Nyong’o said, was to “heal grownup wounds, to give the book I never read growing up” so that children will learn to “love the skin you’re in and [believe] beauty comes from within. It’s never too late to learn to love the skin you’re born in.”
Eoin Colfer, the next speaker, joked about a few technical difficulties involving having packed the wrong eyeglasses and having a brand-new iPad, and thus didn’t deliver his prepared remarks about his new middle grade novel about Artemis Fowl’s siblings, The Fowl Twins (Disney-Hyperion, Nov.). Colfer’s remarks on everything from his last appearance at BookExpo 10 years ago, admitting to having using some salty language then, to apologies for Riverdance, to appreciation for Bruce Springsteen, kept booksellers in stitches. Denying that he was Chris Colfer’s grandfather, Colfer closed his monologue with the assurance that he would be back at BookExpo in 10 years.
The morning’s final speaker brought the theme of the importance of sisters full circle, as Da Chen presented his middle-grade read, Girl Under a Red Moon (Scholastic/Focus, Sept.). Chen recalled the discrimination his family had to deal with during China’s Cultural Revolution, with their property taken from them at gunpoint and their grandfather incarcerated. “We lived in a house without electricity, without proper food,” he said, “A book was a luxury.” His older sister, Sisi, was like a mother figure to Chen, and still calls him “little brother” to this day. At age 13, Sisi was humiliated at school by the principal in front of all the other students and then expelled.
“She was crushed,” and tried to kill herself by jumping into the sea, but was saved from death by a shepherd, who told her to run away from the village to save herself.
“Running away, escape wasn’t easy,” Chen said, noting that he begged Sisi to take him with her. “Girl Under a Red Moon is the story of the real Sisi. [We] survived the revolution.”
Emily Hall, owner of Main Street Books in St. Charles, Mo. told PW that the breakfast speakers were especially inspiring this year. “It was good, it was equal turns funny and poignant. Tomi fan-girling Lupita was just delightful. The way they spoke about the inspiration for writing their books and their love of booksellers makes me feel like what we do is worth it. We’re small fish, so to be recognized on a national stage like this is wonderful.”
