'Challenger Deep' Author to Lead Book Talk in Leesburg Oct. 18

LEESBURG, VA ─ Bestselling author Neal Shusterman will discuss his award-winning book Challenger Deep at Tuscarora High School in Leesburg on Tuesday, October 18 at 7 p.m. All Loudoun residents are welcome to attend the free event. Shusterman will answer questions and sign books following his presentation.

Loudoun County Public Library (LCPL) supplied 12,000 free copies of Challenger Deep to residents, with more than 6,700 distributed to middle schools and high schools throughout the county. Limited copies still remain at LCPL branches. Unlimited ebook and eaudiobook copies are available to library card holders through October 20 at library.loudoun.gov/OverDrive.

Shusterman’s visit is the highlight of Loudoun’s annual "1book 1community program," a reading program that promotes community dialogue and understanding through the shared experience of reading and discussing one book. It is sponsored by the Irwin Uran Gift Fund, which supports LCPL programs.

Challenger Deep, which won the 2015 National Book Award in Young People’s Literature, is the story of Caden Bosch, a teenage boy who questions reality when he intermittently finds himself on a galleon headed for the deepest part of the world’s oceans: the point known as Challenger Deep. His friends and family notice his odd behavior, but no one – not even Caden – can differentiate between reality and fiction. His diagnosis of schizophrenia leads his parents to make a difficult decision, and forces Caden to confront the villains in his head.

“One in three U.S. families is affected by the specter of mental illness,” said Shusterman, author of New York Times bestsellers Bruiser, The Schwa Was There, and the UnWind series. “I know, because our family is one of them. We faced many of the same things Caden and his family did. I watched as someone I loved journeyed to the deep, and I felt powerless to stop the descent. With the help of my son, the illustrator of the book, I’ve tried to capture what that descent was like.”

For more information, visit library.loudoun.gov/1book.

Photo courtesy of LCPL