My 2025 Writing Life: Disaster Ready Kids Series (DRK): Flood, Fire, Earthquake, and Volcanic Eruption (1/4)

As 2025 draws to a close, I look back at a writerly year. I am mighty proud to have launched and presented seven titles of books: 1 series and 3 stand-alone illustrated storybooks for children with @lamparabooks @tuttlepublishing and @thebookmarkinc

First of seven is the Disaster Ready Kids Series (DRK): Flood, Fire, Earthquake, and Volcanic Eruption. @juno_abreu and I were interviewed at the Philippine Book Festival last March 2025, and though we were not in the Bologna Book Fair and the Frankfurt Buchmesse, our series was present. At the MIBF in September, we showed up for meet-and-greet sessions. There were author visits in between, where I had the pleasure of sharing my creative process with young readers and it was a joy to talk about the DRK Series with teachers and literacy experts at the Reading Association of the Philippines’ annual conference last November.

As I end this year, I do so with gratitude. For editors who believed, illustrators who brought heart to the page, publishers who took risks, teachers and librarians who carried these books into classrooms, and children who listened, asked questions, and saw themselves in the stories. Writing, I am reminded, is never solitary. It is sustained by community, trust, and grace. I step into the coming year thankful, grounded and ready to keep telling stories that serve, prepare, and hold.

#writinglife #phchildrensbook