This coming Monday, April 19, marks the 26th anniversary of the tragic event I wrote about in my book All of a Sudden and Forever: Help and Healing After the Oklahoma City Bombing (illustrated by Nicole Xu, and published by Carolrhoda Books/Lerner Publishing).

In the past week, I’ve recorded readings of the book for a church in Oklahoma and a school in Texas, and it was the reading I shared as part of my induction into the Texas Institute of Letters.

I also had the opportunity to tell TeachingBooks a little bit about why and how I made All of a Sudden and Forever, and they have edited my side of the conversation — as well as my reading of a few pages of the book — into this four-minute Meet-the-Author recording.

Please keep the victims’ family members, the survivors, and the first responders in your thoughts this Monday.