(Hint: it wasn’t what you might expect!) She also shows everyone her most well-loved book from when she was a child and how it directly influenced a book she created as an adult. In Donna’s presentations for early elementary school students, she shares how she fell in love with books and reading when she was young. (Donna has a special interest in working with students from low-income families, as she shares her story of growing up in difficult financial circumstances.)

Her lively, popular presentation uses engaging stories and images to show her writing process, including the tools she employs, her research methods, where she finds ideas, and the importance of revision. She illuminates how she navigated challenges and rejections to pursue her lifelong dream of writing a book that landed on the shelves of the Free Library of Philadelphia, where she found solace as a lonely kid. She lives in the Philadelphia area with her family, including her canine office assistant, Benji.Īs a former creative writing teacher, Donna offers an inspiring, humorous, heartfelt presentation perfect for grades 3 through 8 and for family events that shows students who she was and what she read at their age (hint: comic books). Go Be Wonderful, her first picture book, will be published in March 2021.ĭonna is a popular speaker at schools, book festivals, libraries and conferences, including the SCBWI National Conference, the Erma Bombeck Humor Writers' Workshop, NCTE, ILA, ALA, FAME, and many others. Her books have won a number of awards, received starred reviews, landed on many state reading lists, and been selected for schoolwide reading programs. DONNA GEPHART is a professional nerd. Her love for libraries and reading have led her to a career as a children's book author for Delacorte Press/Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster. Her books now reside on the shelves of the library she frequented when she was a child.ĭonna’s humorous and heartbreaking middle grade novels include The Paris Project, In Your Shoes, Lily and Dunkin, Death by Toilet Paper, How to Survive Middle School, and the upcoming Abby, Tried and True (March 2021).

In your shoes by donna gephart