Julie Hutchings: No Tears Book Fair In The Ice Era

And now, a post from Julie Hutchings, author of The Harpy trilogy:

This won’t be the most articulate thing you read today. It’s fueled by absolute fucking fury and the love of children in my community.  

Some quick background, I run the Scholastic Book Fairs at my neighborhood elementary school in the huge school district of Plymouth, MA. America’s Hometown. (Remember that slogan as you continue reading.) This school is so small it doesn’t have a bus. Everyone walks their kids to and from Hedge Elementary, they run businesses in this close-knit neighborhood, lead churches of all kinds in this neighborhood, contribute to events at this school—like me—long after their kids have left it.  

Hedge Elementary school has less than 200 students, with the highest ratio of ELL students and learning and economically challenged students in the district. I could talk about that for a day, but that isn’t what this is about.  

This is about how ICE dragged a man from his car in front of that tiny, 100 year-old school this morning as children were in the crosswalk going to get their breakfast. This is about how the middle school kids who went there, have siblings who go there, who play there after school, watched as ICE wrestled someone out of their car as they got on the bus. Here is a TikTok message that went out to those middle school parents after the bus driver reported the incident:

---

---

This is not simply to piss you off, though I hope it does. My fingers are shaking as I write this.

You can DO something to help these actual kids — RIGHT NOW.  

I named my book fairs the #NoTearsBookFair long ago because I fucking refuse to let any child go home crying because they couldn’t afford a book. I’ve been doing this for over a decade, and pride myself on filling classrooms, kids’ hands, the library, new teachers’ rooms with THOUSANDS of books that this economically challenged group would not have access to. And I don’t just send them home with “a book.” No, those kids get EVERY book they want, I don’t care if it’s the Lego book they only want for the minifigure. If they have to open it, it’s making an impact. NO child is turned away, even if they had money and they just want to read more. You can’t imagine how it feels to have a child who literally arrived in the country with nothing 48 hours ago give you a hug because you gave them a “Welcome to Hedge” stack of books.  

This matters more than ever today.  

My #NoTearsBookFair is starting with tear-filled eyes already. I’ll see them all in a few hours as a bunch of parents who may or may not still have kids at that school sweat their afternoon away building a book fair that’s magical and exciting. 

Donate ANY amount to the #NoTearsBookFair and let’s send these kids home with more goddamn books than they can carry. Let’s put a smile on their face before they go home wondering if their family is safe. Give anything you can and this is the best way you can say FUCK ICE right now.  

---

Julie Hutchings tells scary stories with pretty insides. She also likes karate-kicking, collecting robots, guzzling coffee, chasing it with pizza, and running badass book fairs for all the little boys and girls. Julie lives in America’s Hometown of Plymouth, Massachusetts with her hilarious husband, two genius children, and an army of reptiles. They’re probably doing something Marvel or Star Wars-related right now. If you pay her, Julie also does developmental editing for your novel.