Professionally, Lina Afzali is an estimator for a Lafayette Hill packaging manufacturer. But she’s also an observant mother. And a part-time writer. When she noticed the emotional difficulties of a stepdaughter and a niece dealing with their parents’ divorce, she blended those latter roles to produce a way to help.

Her efforts resulted in a published book: Sofi’s Not So Very Happy Day.

In the plot, title character Sofi wakes up grumpy. And from there, her day goes downhill. Readers follow her attempts to overcome her “not-so-very-happy” time.

“They both had a difficult time trying to process [divorce],” said Afzali, describing her inspiration. “As soon as they’d go to one parent’s house and get comfortable, they’d have to get up and leave and go to the other parent’s house.”

Afzali said that it was an easy hop to extrapolate her family’s bumpy emotions to the difficulties all kids experience occasionally.

“Kids have terrible days; they get upset when things don’t go their way or work out the way they wanted them to. This book shows them that they can learn and grow from those experiences,” Afzali said.

Sofi’s Not So Very Happy Day is available online at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and its publisher’s site, Mascot Books.