Lina is launched!

Cam's Cafe at the Abbotsford Convent has never looked busier or brighter as it did this Sunday past. The rain stopped, just as I'd asked, and dozens of young girls and their families crammed into the cafe to celebrate Our Australian Girls old and new.

All the authors of the published OAG books were there: Sofie Laguna, Gabrielle Wang, Alison Lloyd, Sherryl Clark, Davina Bell and Penny Matthews, who was also there, all the way from Adelaide, to launch her second character in the series, Meet Ruby, along with my first OAG Meet Lina. Most exciting of all, the series illustrator, Lucia Marsciullo came down, all the way from Brisbane, to attend the event and spoke beautifully of her experience of being a relatively recent Australian Girl, having only arrived in Australia from Italy a few years ago.

Jane Godwin, the publisher and series creator with Davina Bell, thanked the enormous team of people who have worked hard to make the series such a success and then prizes of charms and bracelets were given out to girls in the audience, before we all rushed back to the cupcakes and pink champagne. It was a whirlwind kind of a day, so many lovely familiar faces, many I didn't get the chance to say hello to, and also a wonderful opportunity for me to meet many new young readers.

In my speech, I had lots of people to thank, of course, and spoke a little about the people who inspired the Lina stories, but most of all it was my young readers I wanted to thank. So, if you are one of my readers and you weren't able to make it to the launch and missed out on my thanks, my message to you is this:

Every word I write I have you in mind. You are the reason I love what I do and that I am able to do what I love. You make me want to be the best writer I can be and I will always try my hardest to please you. So thank you, thank you.

And happy reading!