Padma Venkatraman

Padma Venkatraman is the internationally acclaimed author of The Bridge Home (Global Read Aloud); Safe Harbor (ALA Notable) and A Time to Dance (1st South-Asian-American YA Novel-in-Verse); Born Behind Bars (Kirkus Best Book of the Century), Island’s End (South Asia Book Award winner) and Climbing the Stairs (Julia Ward Howe Award winner), which have secured over 20 starred reviews and sold over ¼ million copies. She is the winner of  WNDB’s Walter Dean Myers Award for Outstanding Children’s Literature and numerous other awards and honors, from Canada to Spain to Japan. Her books have been featured in the New York Times and Washington Post; and her poems have been published in Poetry and nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Padma’s debut picture book, FARAWAY FAMILY, about making friends with family by bridging generational, linguistic and cultural barriers through the power of creative play, was released in August 2026. Her first nonfiction book, Secret Agent Noor, is scheduled for release in 2027-28 from Macmillian. She has presented keynote addresses at teacher, librarian and writer conferences, appeared on PBS and NPR, and shared her love of reading and writing with audiences of all ages across the globe, including Mongolia, Trinidad and India (where she was born and which she left, alone, at age 19). Before becoming an American citizen, she directed a school in England, served as chief scientist on oceanographic vessels, conducted doctoral and post-doctoral research in environmental engineering at Johns Hopkins and the College of William and Mary, and led diversity efforts. Discover more: www.padmavenkatraman.com ; visit www.diverseverse.org (which she founded) or arrange a visit:  https://theauthorvillage.com/presenters/padma-venkatraman/.