Here's wishing everyone a wonderful new year! Hope it's started well and that it brings you much joy. If you're a writer or teacher, here's a recent list of resources you might find useful: Hugs from Awesome Authors Aida Salazar and Joanna Ho Joyous Moments In 2023 Diverse Verse contains a list of novels-in-verse, old [...]
Teacher Resources
This spring began with so many delightful bits of news: The Bridge Home received another award - The Jerry, presented by WJRC! Born Behind Bars is also on Georgia's state award list! I've been doing a lot of virtual visits, and over the next few weeks, I'll be doing more. On my slides, I quote [...]
All Best For the Rest of 2021 and Happy 2022!
https://videopress.com/v/flYWbh3r?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata Happy Holidays and Happy New Year Wishes! Can't believe 2021 is nearly over. As this year winds down, I'm taking a moment to be grateful for all the honors and awards and praise Born Behind Bars has been blessed with. So far, to my knowledge, it's on the Boston Globe, Kirkus, School Library Journal, [...]
An undreamed of birthday present: Parents Magazine’s love for BORN BEHIND BARS
November is my birthday month - and this year, it came with a wonderful surprise gift. Parents Magazine chose BORN BEHIND BARS as their book-of-the-month! Previous "Raising the Future" book club titles include She Persisted: Ruby Bridges by Kekla Magoon and Chelsea Clinton; Daddy and Dada by Ryan Brockington and Isaac Webster; I Wish You [...]
Compassion is my Compass
So grateful for the warm welcome, starred reviews and praise BORN BEHIND BARS has been receiving! Immense gratitude to the New York Times Book Review, Publishers Weekly, Booklist and Kirkus. Here's a wonderful article about and review of BORN BEHIND BARS in India Currents. Thrilled to hear the wonderful reviews of the book shared by [...]
Born Behind Bars – my 5th novel!
Born Behind Bars I'm so excited to share the news that Born Behind Bars is a Junior Library Guild Selection! And it received it's first review - a wonderful STAR - from Kirkus: " This compelling novel develops at a brisk pace, advanced by evocative details and short chapters full of action... A gritty story, filled [...]
Help India Battle COVID
This weekend was a mixture of joy and grief for me. The joy: #NESCBWI21. I officially accepted my Crystal Kite award at the New England SCBWI conference, presented the closing keynote address, and felt surrounded by the warmth of supportive friends and colleagues. It was a perfect virtual conference experience for me. Yet, through it [...]
Diverse Verse
What a wonderful year for poetry, with Naomi Shihab Nye as our Young People's Poet Laureate, and Amanda Gorman reading aloud the inaugural poem! A personal milestone for me - two of my poems, Undone and Whenever You See a Tree, were published in the March 2021 issue of Poetry Magazine! I said that in [...]
To 2021, With Love…
Wow! Can't believe it's 2 months into 2021 already. I'm trying hard to stay positive, although it's sometimes hard to do so in lieu of the horrific display of violence and white privilege we all witnessed in the United States in early January. Then again, it would be impossible to write a post that doesn't [...]
Poem for the New Year
If you're reading this, healthy 2021 wishes. These days, my more frequently updated blog is the one associated with my website, http://www.padmavenkatraman.com. But as I've done before on this site, I wanted to record and copyright my words - as people have in the past appropriated something I said that they liked and used it [...]