about the book
Sierra Shepard is a member of the Leadership Club and is an honor student at her middle school. And she agrees with her school’s zero-tolerance policy on weapons and drugs.
That is, until she accidently brings her mom’s lunch bag to school: it contained a paring knife. Assuming that her flawless record would exempt her from punishment, she voluntarily turns the knife in to the office.
Finding herself in in-school suspension, Sierra begins questioning the black and white nature of rule-following. She even discovers a new side to “bad boy” Luke Bishop.
Sierra is out of her comfort zone, and the media spotlight thrust upon her by her attorney father sure isn’t helping the situation…
about the author
Born in New York City and raised in New Jersey, Claudia Mills always wanted to be a writer. By the time she was sixteen, she had written hundreds of poems and sonnets, and a hundred-page autobiography!
Claudia earned a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley, a master’s from Princeton, a master’s in library science focusing on children’s literature from the University of Maryland, and a PhD in philosophy from Princeton. At one point Claudia left grad school mid-year to take a secretarial job at a publishing house.
Claudia wrote and submitted manuscripts under a fake name just to see what happened to them. Twice she had to write rejection letters to herself! Then her boss asked her to review a submission and write suggestions for revisions. She tried to be very balanced. And when she got home she opened the letter to her fake name and followed her own advice. That book was published!
Besides writing, Claudia is a professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado and the mother of two boys. The family lives in Boulder with their cat, Snickers. Claudia writes using a felt tip pen on a narrow-ruled pad, lying on the couch. She gets up at five o’clock every morning to write for two hours, and during that time, she gets to be a grade-school kid again!
Sources:
Author website
Author biography: Macmillan Publishers
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