Carmen Agra Deedy

Carmen Agra Deedy is an award-winning author of sixteen books for young readers, including The Rooster Who Would Not Be Quiet!, Martina the Beautiful Cockroach, Rita and Ralph’s Rotten Day, and 14 Cows for America, a New York Times Bestseller. Her latest books are Wombat Said Come In, released in October 2022, Carina Felina, released in August 2023, and The Peanut Man, due to be released in March 2025.

Her personal stories first appeared on NPR’s All Things Considered. Funny, insightful, and frequently irreverent, Deedy’s narratives are culled from her childhood as a Cuban refugee in Decatur, Georgia. She hosts the four-time Emmy-winning children’s program, Love That Book!

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You want your children to write imaginative stories? Let them play. Allow them to be bored and resist the urge to mitigate that tedium. Stories are always there, waiting to be conjured; but first, kids need to be bored out of their ever-loving minds.

Carmen Agra Deedy

Deedy is also an accomplished lecturer, having been a guest speaker for the Library of Congress, Columbia University, the TED and TEDx Conference, and the Kennedy Center, among other distinguished venues. An editor, and lifelong advocate for libraries, she previously served on the Advisory Board of the Smithsonian Libraries and Archives.