Last night Andrew McDonald and Chris Miles delighted a packed room of teachers at Readings, Hawthorn. They discussed how they both use humour to talk about difficult and awkward themes. Andrew’s novel Son of Death is a funny and smart way of talking about death, and Chris’s book Spurt: A balls and All Story offers a hilarious take on going through puberty. Andrew and Chris interviewed each other about their books and how they have both used humour to get these challenging issues out in the open.

After intermission, Fiona Wood and Gabrielle Williams took up the discussion for secondary teachers and spoke together about teenage resilience. Speaking from personal experiences, Fiona and Gabrielle highlighted how teenagers need to have resilience to deal with having spots, through to parents and problematic relationships.

Teachers appreciated hearing from these interesting authors and left after buying vast quantities of books!