Auntie Flora Would Be Proud

Over the last few weeks, I covered several shows at New York Fashion Week for Bluefly.com where I work. I always have a bit of anxiety over what to wear as the weather for the spring shows is in that split personality phase where it's hot one moment and cold the next. I also know the street style photogs will be out and about; and after getting played on a "like it or hate it" sideshow last season, I wanted to make sure I got caught looking as good as I could. To do that, I broke out the buubuus (embroidered caftans) and ruffle print frocks my mom often has made for us in Ghana. (It's relatively cheap, by US/European standards at least, to get custom-made clothing in Ghana.) And I reprised the batakaris my Mom and I play-fight about, rocking them as mini dresses. The looks were big hits as Glamour, New York Magazine's The Cut blog, Essence, and Vogue Black snapped me and my sister. My mom was so proud -- as I know "Auntie Flora" in my book would be. In Powder Necklace, I wrote Lila's fashionista auntie to wear Azzedine Alaia as stylishly as she would an emerald buubuu made in a small tailor's shop in Nima because part of the way I express my pride in being African is through dress. My last show at NYFW was Arise "Made in Africa". Seven designers presented interesting interpretations of traditional African silhouettes and shapes reflective of o many influences. It's always an incredible feeling to see Africa represented on the runway.

The Writers Prayer

Anyone who knows me well, knows I love Beyonce. And JLo.

I relate to their 24 hour hustle because, as a kid, I watched both my parents work literally 20 hour days -- constantly -- toward their goals. (The immigrant hustle by necessity is a tireless one.) Instead of playing "house" when I was younger, I played "Restaurant" or "Modeling Agency" where I was always the owner of the company, taking calls and making decisions. And as an adult I thrive on multiple projects and hard work. Peak performance has been more important to me than sleep and sometimes my health; this philosophy encapsulated in a line of copy I wrote as a copywriter for a NikeWomen desktop wallpaper a few years ago: "Give the Performance of a Lifetime -- Every Time."

As I've gotten older, I've thought about what that line actually means and I realize that part of performing at your peak is conserving your energy -- long distance runner style -- i.e finding balance. So this summer, I sought my equiliibrium by taking a break of sorts from promoting Powder Necklace, and hit the beach when the weather permitted, hung with my friends, watched too many hours of reality TV, and just slept. A lot!

Of course, I shoehorned a lot of work in between. Outside of my day job, I've been contributing articles for JET Magazine and The Atlanta Post, and working on completing my second novel. I have over 500 pages that follow two complicated women from 1962 to present day in Ghana. It needs so much work, and cutting; I wish I could do it all tonight, but, alas, I must conserve my energy.

In the meantime, I wanted to share a poem with you that I started writing literally in a dream. The Saturday night/Sunday morning Hurricane Irene howled outside my window, I dreamt I was prepping to perform at an open mic and wrote the first line of the poem below. I call it "The Writers Prayer" because I pray that I never lose these inspired moments which I believe to be blessings straight from God.

The Writers Prayer

I stick a pen in my chest so I write from the heart
Splat dat on the screen before the editing part
Tap tap on the keys, till I find the right start
Most hours, most days, it's slower than BART

I stick a pen in my throat, s'why I'm not good at verbal
When I speak sometimes, s'like I swallowed the gerbil
That treadmills in my mind
I'm talking in circles
Get to the point.
"Madam, 50 cedis to Circle."

I stick a pen in my hand, it's a weapon of war
Slash, gash, bloodlet,
Apply tourniquet to sore
Then: "Father, may I do it some more?"
("Father, God, thank you.
May I do it some more?")

A pen's stuck in my brain, and it writes in my dreams:
"Wake up, bitch.
You need to tighten that scene.
Slash, gash; mop it up
Yup, wipe that shit clean."

It's a mighty pen, or should I say a laptop?
Fuck around, go ahead and make me miss my train stop.
The Murphy's of Flow: it only starts when I have to stop
Keep it real though
Sometimes it starts and I tell it stop
After my show, then I try to coax it back
Sometimes it comes,
Sometimes it won't call me back.

There's a pen in my eyes, and one in my ears
Both act as a filter to what I see & hear.

These chow pens, and sometimes I can't find one
Digging in my garbage bag till I have to ask for one
"Stranger, Crazy, Miss, can you spare one?"
Paper Mate, please, or a BIC or a Castell
If I must, though I hate,
I'll deal with a fountain
Whatever it takes to facilitate
Little nuggets of wise from the pen in my eyes
Labored pieces of art from the pen in my heart
Necessary surgery
by the scalpel in hand
and the pen in my brain
Serious op'ration
right there on the F train

Then the pen in my hoarse has to cooperate
Eloquent, smooth just like a candidate.
Stump, fly, sell, sell
Don't check your baggage
Damn, heavy as hell

Why do I bother?
S'not even a question.
There's a pen in my heart
hand, brain, and my throat.
If none of them wrote I'd find one that did
Laptop, blackberry, frosty window, kid

Since I was a child hiding at functions
Like Sam,
didn't know I had to answer the unction:
"Lord, Here I am."

Long before the agent "No"s began
Sister Barbara, Mr Hinksmon,
and of course Acquah English
I raise my "hend" not my "haand" to
Thad Z in Freshman English,
Mr. Gifford,
Obika,
Mr. Mamiya,
Moore and Villmoare,
Constance Berkley,
And Sidney.
Davison, Diann,
Mr. Longman...
Silhouette and Harlequin.

There are pens in my... you know
And now there's one on Facebook
Another twies to tweet things that'll make you take a second look

Wherever the pen
Product's subject to the Spirit
Can I--will I be a conduit?
Sans inSpiration
It's just not legitimate

So like Moses did with the staff in
his hand
I throw my pens down
(Whether Mac or PC, or plastic and ink)
And watch the magic begin.

A Summer Recess, Sort Of

Forgive the silence! After a non-stop year of promoting Powder Necklace, I've taken the summer off, sort of.

Essence!!!!

A few weeks ago, I joined some Ghanaian friends on a panel for Brotherhood SisterSol, an amazing organization that supports local black and Latino youth aged 8-21 with everything from after school programming to college prep. The group is taking the kids to Ghana and wanted the panel to share our experiences and give the kids ideas on what to expect. The young men and women had some great questions for us, one of them being: "If Ghana is so great, why are y'all here?" Touché. LOL. Our consensus answer was we've become too spoiled by America's creature comforts to deal with erratic utility services, regular blackouts, dirt roads, etc.

I've also been grinding on my second book, which is helping me understand a lot more about Ghana. Covering Ghanaian history from '62 to the present-day, I'm getting a crash-course in Ghanaian history, Ghanaian-American relations, the charismatic movement, and more. I've had a breakthrough with my writing process on this project! I've mentioned before that my discipline issues had been getting the better of me, thanks to my Basketball Wives/ Keeping Up with the Kardashians addictions, and my recent fixation with the Casey Anthony case and Jaycee Dugard's gripping interviews. BUT the bus has changed everything for me! I discovered a bus near my house that drops me off right by my job and now I spend an hour each morning writing on it. I've been leaving the house earlier than normal so I can continue writing in the library or park before work.

I'm also hard at work organizing a really cool end-of-summer literary event with two fellow authors. I'll tell you more about it as the date approaches.

In between, I've been doing interviews trying to keep the book out there. Check out my recent Q&A in Essence!!!! It's always been a dream of mine to be featured in Essence so please forgive the multiple exclamations.

Tomorrow, I'm doing an interview at 10P on WKCR. Please tune in!

And stick with me into September. I'm super-psyched to be reading at the OrphanAID Africa Benefit on September 15th. In Powder Necklace, there's a character named Enyo who is a maid in the home because her family couldn't afford to keep her. OrphanAID Africa, founded in Ghana by former Vogue stylist and author Lisa Lovatt-Smith, works to protect vulnerable kids by raising funds for families, offering job training services, and more. If you're New York-based, please RSVP. Damon Dash is co-hosting the party if that matters to you (does to me! would be cool to meet him.), and good people will be in the house for an even better cause.

I'm Reading at the Sunday Salon Series with Three International Authors

On Sunday May 15th, please join me and three authors who've penned continent-jumping tomes at Jimmy's No. 43 (43 E. 7th Street. We'll be reading as part of the NYC Sunday Salon Series.

Author bios and book covers are below. Forgive the thumbnail sized images. It's almost 2 in the morning, and really, this amounts to sleep-writing...

Cynthia Morrison Phoel served as a Peace Corps volunteer in a Bulgarian town not unlike the one in her stories in Cold Snap: Bulgaria Stories.
Harmattan Rain, Ayesha Harruna Attah's first novel, was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, Best First Book, Africa Region. She shuttles between Ghana and New York.
Jess Row is the author of two collections of short stories, The Train to Lo Wu and Nobody Ever Gets Lost (just published in February 2011). His fiction has appeared in The Atlantic, Granta, Conjunctions, Ploughshares, and many other journals, and has received a Whiting Writers Award, a PEN/O. Henry Award, two Pushcart Prizes, and three selections for The Best American Short Stories. In 2007 he was named a “Best Young American Novelist” by Granta.
You already know all about me!

I'll never forget something filmmaker Lee Daniels once said...

On April 15th, I had the opportunity to share the African Film Festival panel stage with Dr. Sheila Walker an anthropologist and documentarian whose film Africans Out of Africa screened at the festival, composer Onel Mulet, and moderator Michelle Materre a Media Studies professor at The New School who curates "Creatively Speaking", a forum committed to supporting films and other independent media that offer realistic and universal stories by and about people of color. Needless to say, as a Political Science and Africana Studies major with a concentration in the "politics of beauty", I was completely geeking out.

Nigerian filmmaker Andrew Dosunmu's Restless City -- about an African immigrant surviving on the fringes of New York City -- will screen at BAM on Sunday, May 29th as part of the African Film Festival

We previewed clips of Dr. Walker's film, Joao Daniel Tikhomiroff's Besouro, and Carolina Moraes-Liu's Ebony Goddess: Queen of Ile Aye before diving into conversation about everything from the UN's declaration of the year 2011 as the International Year for People of African Descent to the incredible power of pop-culture portrayals to shape people's perceptions of whole cultures, to diasporic food routes. The intimate gathering at Columbia University's Institute for African Studies lent itself to a true roundtable discussion. One particular aspect of our conversation that titillated me, questioned whether artists of color must produce work that is political/responsible/deep; and how to move beyond cultural ideas of what Africa/Africans/African-Americans/blackness is "supposed" to look/sound/read like, to move the entire culture forward.

Diaspora Food: Collard greens are an awful lot like Ghanaian kontomire stew

I might have mentioned this in a prior post, but I'll never forget something filmmaker Lee Daniels once said. He was promoting his then new film The Woodsman about a recently paroled child molester living next door to a school, and he said he considered casting Samuel L. Jackson for the lead -- but his mother begged him not to put a black man in such a wound-opening role. The part ultimately went to Kevin Bacon, with rapper/actor Mos Def playing the cop monitoring the title character's return to society. Daniels later told me in a phone interview for his film Shadowboxer, that his mother wishes he would do more family-friendly fare like Tyler Perry does.

If only Mama Daniels knew what a powder keg of criticism Tyler Perry's films ignite. With his depictions of middle class African-American life, the director has elicited conflicted emotions and sharp debate amongst a large group of blacks with many celebrating his immense success while lambasting him for mishandling the black story via soap operatic characters, over the top plot devices, and cringe-inducing catchphrases like "Hallelujer" that dredge up stereotypes about black dialect. The critique from fellow filmmaker Spike Lee in particular caused Perry to lash out.

Of course there was no resolution to our debate at the Film Festival panel about the virtues (or lack thereof) of films like Baby Boy (one of my faves by the way) and Don't Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood for example, versus the work of helmers like Julie Dash, Kasi Lemmons, and Spike Lee. Partly because of the fact that there are so few successful black filmmakers, and mostly because of the human inability to please everyone, the real anxiety is rooted in the fact that the few depictions out there have so much power.

Author K.C. Washington founded her novelty postcard business Noir-a-Gogo featuring 1950s pin-ups because images of the times usually omit black sex symbols. "We were there!" her promotional materials shout.

This same debate is raging in black literary circles as so-called "street lit"/"urban fiction" titles share shelf space in African-American book sections next to literary classics by James Baldwin, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Wright, Alice Walker, and Toni Morrison; as well as contemporary works by writers like Zadie Smith and Edwidge Danticat. In the year that I've been working to promote Powder Necklace, I've had numerous conversations with other writers about this situation where I express my commitment to getting to a time and place where all of these really different stories can coexist without bearing the weight of upholding a narrow definition of blackness.

If Steven Spielberg can direct one of the most enduring depictions of black women, and Kathryn Stockett can write a story about black maids in the dialect of the black south, and Chris Cleave can pen a bestselling novel about a Nigerian girl, black artists must be free to put out work that reflects their inspiration.

with Cheetah Girls author Deborah Gregory and Harmattan Rain author Ayesha Harrunah at Delta Sigma Theta's "Reading Helps Your Imagination Bloom" Book Fair

On April 10th, I joined Cheetah Girls series novelist Deborah Gregory, Butterfly Rising author Tanya Wright (and Cosby Show alum who was Theo's girlfriend "before Justine" she reminded us), Christian career advice writer Carol Mackey, The Cheating Curve author Paula Renfroe, and my ace Ayesha Harruna Attah at the Delta Sigma Theta book fair at Medgar Evers college. As some of the writers in the room rose to introduce professors, parents, children, and book lovers to their works, it struck me that you could not have brought a more diverse assortment of authors together.

Likewise, on April 30th, two lawyers, an ex-con, an author and publisher, a bartender, a poet, a cat lover, the descendant of a black Civil War vet, and a fashion blogger -- all authors -- converged in the Harvest Room of the Jamaica, Queens Farmer's Market for the "April is Book Month in Queens" fair. K.C. Washington (who owns Novelty Postcard business Noir-a-Gogo), David L, Fabiola Sully, Cathleen Williams, Natasha "Mz Grammy Bear" Graham, Willie Cooper, and Sandra Glaves Morgan were among the disparate group selling their literary wares, each with a unique, yet equally rousing story to share.

The up-and-comers in the room were all at different stages of our literary careers, and we're taking different paths to advance; but as black authors we have to feel free to get there in our own way -- even if it's uncomfortable a la Samuel Jackson as child molester/a white woman writing in black dialect, even if it isn't terribly good -- but especially when it's great. Ytasha L. Womack's book Post-Black has awesome things to say on this topic.

Happy Birthday, Powder Necklace!

A year ago today, Powder Necklace was released!! Thanks to all who have cheered me along on this journey -- the Facebook posts, tweets and encouraging emails have been fuel; and to the writers, editors & friends who took the time to sit me down and give me advice, open up their networks to me, and share opportunities with me. The learning curve has been sharp and quick.

The 10 practical things I've learned this year are:

1. At a book signing, never ever stay seated behind the table and wait for people to come to you. Get up and get a book/promotional postcard in as many hands & faces as possible.

2. Always keep a promotional postcard on you & don't be shy about giving them out.

3. Don't be intimidated by the person you're trying to sell a book to (Amish people like books too)

4. Don't be intimidated by the opportunity. If they invited you to be part of it, you deserve to be there.

5. Your friends and family should not be expected to attend every single event you're having to promote the book. They have a copy already. Just let them know about the events that are really important to you.

6. Bring an envelope of singles to events so you/people don't have to wait or hunt for change. (I need to get better about this one.)

7. Keep it all in perspective. Yes, you must shill, but you also must chill.
5.

8. Reach out to and support other authors. It's good kharma, plus they understand what you're going through on a completely other level.

9. Keep your eyes peeled for new opportunities to promote your work. Actively seek out book clubs/organizations/movements that would be into the themes of your book and pitch yourself as a speaker/panelist, etc; stay on top of your community events calendar.

10. Set up a Google Alert for yourself and book so you can stay on top of reviews and other mentions of your work and respond.

Thanks again for following along. It's been a dream come true.

All in the Family

The National Ghana Parade Council's Distinguished Tongue Series launch and book signing at Nectar Wine Bar was fantastic. After nearly a year promoting Powder Necklace (the book turns 1 on April 6th!!), I never know who will show up to an event. My family and friends all have the book and have more than showed their support, trooping to different venues across the city, buying multiple copies, and spreading the word to their friends. It ended up being a mega-reunion for me.

A great friend from college that I haven't seen in years Facebooked to let me know he would be coming, so I was psyched to see him, but I was not expecting to see my play cousins from back in the day! When my parents came to this country, they formed a tight community of fellow Ghanaians that became our extended family and three of the kids I grew up playing with in upstairs bedrooms while our parents talked politics in Ga downstairs were in the house. It was so crazy to see my one cousin in particular whom I had not seen since she was like 12! I almost wanted to snatch the glass of wine from her hand, but alas, she's a woman now.

After I hugged fellow author Ayesha Harruna Attah and started to set my books up on the table, another ghost from my past strode into the room from behind the Employees Only area. Now one of Nectar's directors, she used to be my boss at one of my first jobs out of college!

Then a gentleman approached to let me know he had come to find out if I was related to Professor Abeeku Brew-Hammond (the same Uncle Abeeku I thank in the last sentence of my acknowledgments at the back of the book). My dad's little brother teaches in the College of Engineering at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology and this young man was one of his students. But what was so cool about meeting him was that he had designed an energy-efficient car model under the encouragement of my uncle, and I remember Uncle Abeeku emailing us about this student's good work, complete with a jpeg of the car.

As I bounced around the room catching up with fam and friends from the past, and the contingent of friends who graciously listened as I repeated the spiel they've heard many times over, I felt like I was exactly where I was supposed to be at that moment.

The Council did an amazing job creating an easygoing yet purposeful networking vibe. Business cards were swapped, funds were raised for a scholarship fund, and in keeping with the spirit of the series--a celebration of the many diverse languages spoken in Ghana and across Africa, with a mind toward encouraging dialogue and unity--a multitude of tongues were represented. Even though I got to the venue after a full day of work, I stayed long after the signing, chilling with old and new friends.

Anyway, I promise to post pics once I get them. My camera's flash died several months ago so I haven't been on top of taking pics at events as I should.