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Jen Arena

Home Featured Authors & Panelists Featured Participant Lineup 2025 Jen Arena

Jen Arena has been writing books for kids for over 20 years, both fiction and nonfiction, from board books to picture books to early chapter books. She lives near a park full of beautiful old oak trees in Tampa, Florida, which inspired her book Acorn Was a Little Wild. Arena has written a number of popular and award-winning books, including Besos for Baby, Lady Liberty’s Holiday, and Marta! Big and Small.

 

Schedule

9:45 am to 10:15 am
A.Z. Young Park, Author Tent D
Louisiana Readers’ Choice Award Ceremony for Grades K to 2
Winner – Acorn Was a Little Wild by Jen Arena
Honor – Anglerfish: The Seadevil of the Deep by Elaine M. Alexander

11:00 am to 11:30 am
Children’s Author Tent 3
Acorn Was a Little Wild
(Ages 2 to 5)

11:45 am to 12:30 pm
Cavalier House Books Tent
Book Signing

Acorn was a Little Wild

Jory John’s Bad Seed series meets After the Fall by Dan Santat in this charming picture book about a young acorn’s grand adventure and the incredible transformation that follows.

Acorn is a little wild, and from his oak tree perch, he longs for adventure. When he’s the first of his friends to jump off the oak tree, he’s on his way into the wide world, full of new experiences that fill his little heart with excitement!

But when a squirrel buries Acorn deep underground, the thrill-seeking Acorn finds himself forced to stay still, in the darkness, for a long time. To turn this biggest setback into a wild adventure, Acorn may have to change from the inside out.