What draws you to write for young readers?
I started writing when I was younger and I'm still younger, so it helps me work through a lot of the life experiences and feelings that I'm having. I've recently started writing a middle grade and there's also something so magical about revisiting that time. I actually hated being in middle school, but middle grade books have this simplicity in the way they tell stories that feels so strong and original. I feel like, regardless of category, kid lit can get away with stuff we aren't used to seeing in adult fiction.
What message(s) do you want to share in your work?
I think it depends on the book and gets more specific from story to story, but I really want to center the stories of Black girls, especially Black girls who are queer or fat, and explore smaller moments that aren't really deemed important enough for a story. I love moments of sitting with your family or going to the beach for vacation and how these normal things can become entire books. I feel like there's often pressure to have a "high concept" story that you can describe in a sentence, and I try to reverse engineer it by coming up with a pitch but having lots of quiet moments within.
Please tell us a bit about your upcoming book, Friday I'm In Love.
Friday is about a teen girl named Mahalia who is sad that she missed the chance to have her own Sweet 16, and decides to throw a lavish coming out party where she'll celebrate her sexuality with her loved ones, all while dealing with a crush on a new girl at school and her mother's loss of her job. I actually wrote it when I was 18, four years ago, and it feels like a completely different time. I'm really excited for it.
How do you go about telling stories that so realistically capture experiences?
Ah, thank you! I spend a lot of time people watching and probably thinking about how I'd reflect behaviors or instances in my books. Like something will happen to it and I immediately try to figure out how to write it. I very much believe in the Nora Ephron saying, "Everything is copy." But I also think having multiple rounds of edits is really helpful. Something is added to the stew each time and it only makes it better and richer.
Any message for young creators who encounter your work in their classrooms and school libraries?
I'm really grateful that you're reading!
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