Torrey Maldonado and Jennifer Clark, Festival co-director. This year’s Festival will be May 2
By Lisa Green of Rural Intelligence
Authors, teachers and literacy lovers generated an enthusiastic buzz at the Hudson Children’s Book Festival fundraising cocktail party on Saturday, March 28 at Stair Galleries. With more than 70 percent of the students in the Hudson Community School District living below the poverty line, one of the goals of the Children’s Book Festival Scholarship Fund, founded by Chris Jones and Susan Simon, is to provide hundreds of Hudson students the money to buy a book at the Festival. The fund also awards several high school seniors scholarship money to buy books at college. Students passed hors d’oeuvres and read passages from a book whose National Book Award-winning author will be attending the festival. Torrey Maldonado, a “Top 10 Latino Author” and author of the acclaimed novel “Secret Saturdays,” described what sets the Hudson Children’s Book Festival (the largest children’s book festival in New York State) apart from others. “You see love there, ” he said. “Kids are allowed to express their love for books. Your donation is about voice and choice.”
Janet Schnitzer, past president of the Hudson Area Association Library and Vicki Kosovac, president of the Friends of the Hudson Area Library
Ellen Huemmer, a teacher, and Diane Kreig, a retired reading teacher
Owen Davidson, Chris Jones, scholarship fund co-founder, and Mark Prezorski, landscape curator at The Olana Partnership.
Atia Begh, Ramisa Tasnim and Brittany Varriale, students from Hudson High, read passages aloud from “Brown Girl Dreaming,” whose award-winning author, Jacqueline Woodson, will appear at the Festival.
https://ruralintelligence.com/parties/chapter-1-hudson-childrens-book-festival-fundraiser
