Nonprofit gives young Georgia author battling sickle cell disease her own book signing – CBS News

Nonprofit gives young Georgia author battling sickle cell disease her own book signing  CBS News

Amiaya Brown realized she wanted to become an author when she started coming up with short stories while writing her book reports. "I just started writing it. And I would be like, 'Mom, look, read it. I made 10 pages today.' And she would just be like, 'Oh, OK, cool.' And she would be like, giving me pointers of what she thought was good and thought I should edit."That led her to write her first book, "The Unassuming Hero." It follows a teenage girl on a mission to save her best friend after she is abducted at a theme park. Brown, who battles sickle cell, says writing is her way of putting her thoughts out into the world.Then Yes Day discovered her work.

The nonprofit creates personalized events to bring children joy, hope, and connection during some of life's hardest moments. For Brown, they threw a book signing in her honor in Dunwoody."It's like, exciting, overwhelming. When I first came out, I was like–because everybody was just standing right by the bookstore," Brown said. Brown's mother, Ashley, says it's been difficult watching her daughter fight sickle cell. "Earlier in her life, she wasn't hospitalized often. But the last two years, Amiaya was in the hospital literally every month for sickle cell pain. So, what that meant is sometimes she was