In a galaxy not too long ago, there was a little girl who played Dungeons and Dragons on Saturday afternoons. She made her brother suffer through HBO’s monthly showings of Mike Hodges’ Flash Gordon. She preferred Greek mythology over Civics. And before cosplay became a thing, she created character costumes from her favorite comic book, Elf Quest.
And yes, this little girl (I’m sure you’ve guessed by now its me) fell head long into paranormal/fantasy/sci-fi romance and never looked back. If the story featured a person of color, they were an automatic one-click! Unfortunately, many of these romances proved hard to find. So when A.M. Griffin recently launched POC Paranormal Author website it felt like Christmas. But what’s so weird or should I say disturbing about this tale of inclusion is the fact that before now there were no blogs or websites that solely recognized books in these genres featuring people of color written by people of color.
Can we digest that please….
I spoke with Griffin recently and she’s extremely passionate about recognizing fellow authors of color and their books. She envisions her website as a hub for all things paranormal–including sci-fi and fantasy–written by authors of color. She hopes readers will come to the site, find books by their favorite authors or discover a fresh voice to enjoy. There will be reader giveaways and contests, reviews and a weekly round-up of book releases.
Although the website is still in its infant stages, Griffin has long term plans, “I want it to continue to grow. I want to add more authors and their stories. I want to have informational, informative as well as funny and engaging blog posts. I want authors to be able to find a list of genre friendly bloggers and reviewers in one spot.”
I’m ALL in!
How about you? Ready to get your fantasy on? Visit the POC Author website and sign up for their reader newsletter to receive up-to-date information regarding the site and new releases. You can also follow them on Twitter.
