“Books are meat and medicine and flame and flight and flower, steel, stitch, and cloud and clout, and drumbeats in the air.” – Gwendolyn Brooks “I am…a children’s book author who aspires to be a griot.” – Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow These quotes reveal much about today’s honoree, her motivation as an author, and the soulful, healing [ Read the full article… ]
28 Days
Day 17: Nicole Collier
Nicole D. Collier, Ph.D., was born and raised just south of Atlanta, Georgia. After a short stint in journalism, she has spent the past two decades in education. First as an elementary school teacher, and now as a partner in an executive training, coaching and consulting firm. Nicole writes for all ages, but her first [ Read the full article… ]
Day 16: Brittany J. Thurman
Brittany J. Thurman has storytelling in her soul. “I have always had an affinity for stories told by my grandmother,” she says. “Those same stories hold space in my writing today. My love of writing comes from my love of reading. As a kid, I could not get enough of going to bookstores and libraries.” [ Read the full article… ]
Day 15: Michelle Coles
Debut young adult author Michelle Coles fought for civil rights as an attorney before expanding her mission to include writing history stories for teens that filled them with purpose and pride. Listed as one of the John & Lillian Miles Lewis Foundation’s Good Troublemakers, she says on that site: “It is my responsibility to bring [ Read the full article… ]
Day 14: Reggie Brown
Years ago, when we first started the 28 Days Later initiative, I gladly took on the task of covering the illustrators. I worried though. At that time, there were only a handful of working Black illustrators in the field—about enough to count on ten fingers and a few toes. For that reason, I limited the [ Read the full article… ]
Day 13: Lakita Wilson
An accomplished middle-grade author with young adult and picture book projects on the way, Lakita Wilson is a name to watch. On her journey to being published, she received SCBWI’s Emerging Voices Award and earned a MFA in writing for children and young adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts. Today, she looks for new [ Read the full article… ]
Day 12 – J. Elle
There’s a certain heart you need to create for young readers. I think many children’s lit creatives were likely the same folks who, at some point, thought about becoming educators but for some reason or another didn’t. The heart of today’s creative is giving me vibes of that, primarily because she was in fact in [ Read the full article… ]
Day 11: Charnaie Gordon
You may have seen the countless cover reveals she has hosted. Or read her inspiring posts celebrating BIPOC children’s book creators. Or maybe you heard her fun and engaging interviews that make authors and illustrators feel like friends. A dedicated advocate for diverse children’s books, influencer Charnaie Gordon champions reading through her popular blog, Here [ Read the full article… ]