Jodi Moore and Sarah K. Stephens, two local authors, will meet the public from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, July 15, at Schlow Centre Region Library’s BookFest tent. BookFest, which will feature a number of other authors, too, coincides with the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts.
“I fell in love with books on my mother’s lap,’ said Moore, of Boalsburg. ‘Early in life I wanted to be an artist, but I was always writing, too. I wrote stories and illustrated them.”
She received a bachelor’s degree in biology secondary education, and taught physics for a bit. She then worked at various sales jobs while helping her husband run Larry Moore Productions, the couple’s Boalsburg-based disc jockey business.
While working as assistant to the executive director of the Festival of the Arts, Moore ‘rediscovered my passion for writing, and took on the role of monthly newsletter editor.”
She now is an author of books for children and young adults, including ‘When a Dragon Moves In.’
When Moore’s two sons were growing up, they liked to build sandcastles with their father. After the boys had gone off to college, the Moores took their first trip to the beach without their sons. Larry Moore once again gravitated toward building sandcastles, and a swarm of children soon stood watching. As one little boy pulled a piece of seaweed from the lake and put it in the doorway, he said, “That looks like a dragon’s tail. Our castle is so cool, a dragon moved in.”
“And the story idea was born,” said Moore.
“When a Dragon Moves In” was published by Flashlight Press and came out in 2011. ‘When a Dragon Moves In Again,’ Moore’s next book, hit the bookshelves of independent bookstores, Amazon and Barnes and Noble on Sept. 1, 2015.
Moore often is called on for author presentations at schools. She offers two options: for primary grades, “Building a Story is Like Building a Sandcastle,” and for grades four through 12, “Your Words Matter.” She feels strongly that stories have the power to teach, to connect and to heal.
Dr. Sarah K. Stephens also will sign copies of and discuss her debut novel, ‘A Flash of Red,’ with visitors at BookFest.
Stephens is a writer, developmental psychologist and university lecturer. Her novel, a psychological thriller, was released in December by Pandamoon Publishing.
She said she got involved with BookFest when Amy Madison, of Schlow Library, contacted her. Her name had appeared on a list of new authors, and her book received 4 1/2 stars out of five on UndergroundBookReviews.com.
Stephens spends spring and fall in the classroom, but she writes all year. Her short stories and essays have appeared in National Book Critics circle, The Indianola Review, Five on the Fifth and LitHub.
She grew up in Youngstown, Ohio, and graduated from Youngstown State University. She came to State College to attend Penn State for graduate school and never left. Her doctorate is in human development and family studies.
“I love what I do and working with the students,” she said. “And, I love my writing. I’ve always been a student of human behavior and use that in my writing.”
