SCHOOL VISITS & EVENTS
School Events
I would love to visit your school to meet students and inspire creativity, reading and empathy! I offer an assembly-style presentation, a selection of class workshops, or a combination or both.
I have experience of working with students as part of the 826 Valencia nonprofit in San Fransisco, where I spent a few years as a volunteer tutoring under-resourced children in creative writing and journalism. I’m also an Empathy Lab trained author.
Please download my schools letter to read more about available sessions/fees:
Bookshop sessions
I offer a 30 - 60 min fun, free interactive session for small groups in bookshops, assuming books can be provided for sale.
The sessions involve a TRUE OR FALSE octopus fact quiz and a comic-strip building session with worksheets — looking inside the mind of some animals as we build our stories. Also, a reading and a book signing. It can also include a personality quiz — Which Character From The Octopus, Dadu and Me Are You Most Like?
I also offer a more flexible origami secret letter session, where we write and decorate a letter or question for an older person in our lives.
Events, festivals, panels
Workshops.
A variety of workshops are available, please enquire.
Chair.
With a background in broadcast and interviewing for the BBC, I am very much at home on your event stage and would happily chair panel events or interview authors.
For the BBC, I have interviewed entertainment figures from Paul McCartney to Colin Firth, Stevie Wonder to Will.i.Am. For my personal book blog, I have interviewed authors including Sally Rooney and twice National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward.
Experience of live TV as a regular guest on the BBC News Channel means I am a confident and adaptable host.
Guest.
I am happy to speak on panels, and specialise in talking about empathy, dementia and coping with loss, as well as STEM’s place in children’s fiction.
