I wrote something this spring — began writing it for myself, initially, because I needed to process something that I was in the midst of dealing with — that this past week ended up as a Soapbox column for Publishers Weekly.

It begins:

I had a bit of a situation recently after I featured my newest nonfiction picture book in a presentation to a Texas audience of engrossed fourth graders and their unnerved teachers.

By “a bit of a situation,” I mean it was a Very 2022 Mess that threatened to spill over into my scheduled visits to several other elementary schools in the same district.

The book in question was Moving Forward: From Space-Age Rides to Civil Rights Sit-Ins with Airman Alton Yates…

I hope you’ll read the rest here.

And for more about the book at the heart of this situation, just click on the cover:

Moving Forward