This event is part of the Book Week Scotland 2020 Digital Festival. It is a pre-recorded event.

Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam join Patrice Lawrence to discuss their new YA novel in verse, Punching the Air, which tells the story of how one boy is able to maintain his humanity and fight for truth when he is wrongly incarcerated by a system designed to strip him of both.

Dr. Yusef Salaam is one of the Exonerted Five who were the subject of lauded Netflix drama When They See Us. He is now an edcuator and activist who uses his platform to advocate for criminal justice reform, prison reform and the abolition of juvenile solitary confinement and capital punishment.

Ibi Zoboi is an award winning Haitian-American author , know for her previous YA books Pride, American Street and Black Enough:stories of being young and Black in America.

Patrice Lawrence is a celebrated YA novelist who has worked for a prison arts organisation, leading creative writing sessions in prisons, and is also on the advisory board for the Howard Reform League's guide on Making Black Lives Matter in the UK criminal justice system.​

Accessibility information: British Sign Language, closed captions and a transcript are available.

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