I was raised in Harlem. I never found a book that took place in Harlem. I never had a church like mine in a book. I never had people like the people I knew. People who could not find their lives in books and celebrated felt bad about themselves. I needed to write to include the lives of these young people.
A knowledge of different literatures is the best way to free one's self from the tyranny of any of them.
Somehow, I realized I could write books about black characters who reflected my own experiences or otherworldly experiences - not just stories of history, poverty and oppression.
I remember that feeling when I was a young reader: finding books that were set in Sydney with Australian characters was incredibly exciting.
My parents have taught me the value of reading and self-love through books that have characters that look like me and talk like me.
Readers are hungry to have their stories in the world, to see mirrors of themselves if the stories are about people like them, and to have windows if the stories are about people who have been historically absent in literature.
It wasn't that the teachers were bad. From what I can remember, they were pretty good. It was about the selection of books. It was about not seeing my young life reflected back to me: my family dynamics, the noise and complexities of my neighborhood, the things I loved, like ice cream trucks and Kool-Aid.
I try to widen the horizons of every child I meet, and part of that is promoting diverse forms, be it graphic novels, stories told in a narrative voice, or more translated books, as well as more diverse writers and more diverse characters.
It's really important to me to follow the kinds of conversations that happen around diversity and representation and writing inclusive books.
As a child I read all kinds of stuff, whether it was 'Asterix and Obelix' and 'Tin Tin' comic books, or 'Lord of the Rings,' or Frank Herbert's sci-fi. Or 'The Wind in the Willows.' Or 'Charlotte's Web.'
I read pretty eclectically - fiction, non-fiction, and poetry - and I've been inspired and influenced by a number of writers.
Even though I read voraciously as a child, I never saw myself in books. Without narratives to expand my ideas of who I could be, I accepted the stories others told me about myself, stories which diminished and belittled me and people like me. I want to write against that.
I would like to champion diverse forms like graphic novels and works told in verse and diverse writers and illustrators and diverse authors as well.
If a kid is reading a book about someone who looks like them but doesn't talk like them, we stunt their growth by dissing them.
When I was growing up, my house was filled with books. My mother was an educator, and my father was a history buff, so our home was a virtual library, covering every author from Beverly Cleary to James Michener.
I've never gotten anything but support and thanks from people for having diverse books.
I think kids in every minority need to see people like themselves in books; that's an acknowledgment of their existence on this planet and in this society.
I believe we need more culturally diverse books - about disabled characters, though not about their disability, about people with different sexual orientations, or a boy who is a cross-dresser. We need to reflect the diversity of our society.
I'm a voracious reader, and I like to explore all sorts of writing without prejudice and without paying any attention to labels, conventions or silly critical fads.
