One spring day in 1999, I received a call asking me to speak to a fourth grade class on being an author. People from all kinds of professions were being asked to speak at schools around Marin County, California on Career Day. I happily accepted. But as the day grew closer, I worried about how I could talk about my book without explaining what the story was about. How would fourth graders handle the subject of a mother giving up her child? I called the principle of the school to tell her what my book was about and ask her advice. “No,” she said. “I would not want you to discuss that subject with the children.” She was quite firm about it and, even though I, too, had some trepidation I was lef
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