You Had to Be There

This is a special event for Biola Youth Academics families and friends. In this workshop Ms. Hardy leads teen writers in individual and group activities that include ways to make readers feel like they are right in the midst of the action.

Although she grew up in the American Midwest in the 1950s and 60s, LeAnne Hardy has lived in six countries on four continents as a missionary librarian. She has sipped cream tea in Oxfordshire, eaten stewed goat at a Mozambican wedding, slid down rocks in a Mato Grosso river and shopped at Mall of America. Her books for children and young people come out of her cross-cultural experiences and her passion to use story to convey spiritual truths in a form that will permeate lives. She has been married since 1973 and has two daughters, two sons-in-law, and three grandchildren. She has BA in Philosophy (Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, 1973) and an MA in Library and Information Science (University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, 1977). Her secret love has always been children’s literature and didn't start writing seriously until she was well into her forties. 

"I write for children and young people because they have their whole lives ahead of them. I want to stretch their world and give them images that will challenge the way they think about God, life and what faith in action looks like. Our planet, Earth, contains many worlds that seldom seem to touch. It’s easy to live in one familiar community and forget that anyplace else exists. Whether it is an African country in civil war, a time period long past, or a community of figure skaters and hockey players in a small American town, people love, create, experience pain, long for friendship and need to feel valued—all the things that make us human. I write about places I have known and communities I am discovering. I ask, what would it be like to live in that world--to be part of a community with different expectations, different values, different experiences from what I am used to? "      LeAnne Hardy