Growing as an Author with “It’s Chinese New Year, Curious George”

My debut book, “It’s Chinese New Year, Curious George,” launched on January 3, 2023. Since then, I’ve been building my career as a visiting author. It’s been slow, but steady. Each year I learned more.

The timing for author visits for this book was always tight, given its seasonality. This year, Chinese New Year fell on January 29. That meant I had only a couple of weeks in January before that date to do author visits. For some school districts, school didn’t resume until January 6 (later than usual). Schools typically didn’t want to hold big assemblies as soon as they came back from December break. I typically avoided doing author visits in December because everyone was in holiday mode and not thinking about Chinese New Year.

The good thing about Chinese New Year was that it lasted for 15 days. That meant even though it started in late January, it continued into the first couple of weeks in February. This provided opportunities to schedule more author visits after the Chinese New Year started.

For the first time, I did a library tour of Long Island. I had reached out to many local libraries, and some found me on their own. I put together a roster of five libraries between dates already scheduled with school districts. At the libraries, I taught kids about the traditions of Chinese New Year using my book as a guide and also offered a craft for kids to make and bring home. There were many happy little faces at my events!

As for school visits, I loved the energy of hundreds of students in one room. I presented to a wide range of grades from Kindergarten to Grade 6. Though the older kids in grades 5 and 6 were beyond the reading level of my book, they still loved my presentation because it was not just a book reading. It was about Chinese culture and how the traditions came to be. I enjoyed the older students because they asked really good questions. They inquired not only about the Chinese New Year, but also about how to write a book, the publishing industry as a whole, and more.

Another new experience this year was presenting at a community event. The Chinese American Association of East Williston (CAAEW) invited me to be the guest speaker at their Lunar New Year event at Town Hall. The CAAEW leaders were organized and went “all out” with very festive decorations. It was a beautiful event with lots of families participating. Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena was also in attendance. I was glad to see community support for an event celebrating Chinese culture.

My author visits don’t end with the completion of Chinese New Year. I have other presentations that I use at author visits year-round. They include a “Career Day Children’s Book Author” presentation and “How to Write a Children’s Book.” Both use my book as an example to guide the content. If your school or PTA may be interested in bringing me in for an author visit, please reach out via my contact page.

Thank you for following me on my writing journey! I appreciate your ongoing support!