I had a great time at the Bronx Book Festival on June 8, on the panel “Your Block, My Block: Your Block, My Block: Setting the Stage in Literature,” talking with fellow panelists (from left to right below) Sarina Prabasi (The Coffeehouse Resistance) and Lisa Ko (The Leavers) and our great moderator Angie Cruz (Soledad, Dominicana).

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The festival, founded and run by the seemingly tireless Saraciea Fennell, is an annual event aimed at promoting literacy and fostering a love of reading among children, teens, and adults. This year’s event took place at Fordham Plaza and on the library lawn at Fordham University and featured three separate stages, book sellers, and more.

The highlight of the day for me was hearing Justice Sonia Sotomayor being interviewed by Sesame Street‘s Sonia Manzano as the kick-off keynote. I took pictures, but the justice asked that we just keep them for personal use and not social media, and I obey the justice.

I got to sell the majority of the books, in cooperation with the newly opened Lit. Bar (go there, go there now), I brought with me and signed them away to (I hope) new fans.