What the Conversations Keep Bringing Me Back To
Recent podcast reflections, the questions beneath my books, and where we can meet next
Four faces filled the screen, four indie authors carrying different books and many of the same hard-earned lessons.
On July 12, I joined Amanda Coreishy, Jasmaine Payne, and Dale Mahfood for DIY Indie Publishing: Talking Shop with Indie Authors. We came prepared to speak about creative control, building a readership, author tools and publishing on our own terms.
Those subjects matter deeply to me.
Becoming an indie author required me to unlearn the belief that a gatekeeper had to approve my voice before readers could receive it.
Creative control allowed me to keep the cultures, spiritual traditions, contradictions, and emotional truth that belong in my work. Still, the conversation did not remain inside the mechanics of publishing. It rarely does.
A few weeks earlier, Amanda and I spoke on Trouble at Taboo Junction about Beyond First Glance, my most recent literary offering. We moved through new love meeting its first complications, mature relationships under strain, friendship, grief, self-love, longing, heartbreak, and repair. Here’s the replay:
The questions beneath the questions were the ones I keep returning to in my fiction.
What do we inherit from the people who taught us how to love?
What must we release if we want to choose differently?
How do we repair what is broken without losing ourselves in the process?
Writing Scarlet Birthright helped me confront the resentment I carried toward my father. Writing Beyond First Glance asked me to examine what happens after desire has done its dazzling work and ordinary life arrives. Speaking about these books does something different. It reminds me that once a story reaches readers, the conversation becomes larger than the writer.
That conversation is continuing in several places, coming up soon, and I would love to meet you in one of them.
On Sunday, July 26, I will be at Pages in the City NYC: The Urban Book Expo in Jamaica, Queens. I am bringing my catalog and a limited blush-and-gold event edition of Love in the Dark: A Holiday Romance for Grown-Ups. Reserved copies include a luxe bookmark and can be collected at my table.
A Summer Book Fair with a Holiday Twist
There is something deliciously delightful about talking about the holidays in the middle of July, so here I am, fully leaning in.
On Saturday, August 1, at 3:30 p.m. Eastern, Well Read Sistas will host me for a virtual Behind the Pages conversation about the inspiration for Beyond First Glance, interconnected stories, love, friendship, family, second chances, and writing complex characters across the Black diaspora.
On Thursday, August 6, at 6:00 p.m., I will be at A Midsummer Night’s Romance at Cindelle’s Bookstore, 401 Watchung Avenue in Plainfield, New Jersey. Five writers will gather for an evening of readings and community.
Then, on Saturday, August 29, I will join readers and writers at the Harlem Book Fair, held at the Adam Clayton Powell Jr. State Office Building on 125th Street.
And on, Sunday, August 30 at 1:00 PM ET, I have the honor of hosting the virtual Launch of Reputation by author, Amanda Coreishy. Join us for a live Zoom conversation celebrating the launch of Reputation, a gripping novel about desire, belief, family expectations, and a young woman’s fight to reclaim control of her own story.
The books opened the door. These conversations are what happen when readers walk through it.
How are you, really? Are you navigating a season of unlearning an inherited pattern right now? Reply and tell me what that season has been asking of you.
Àṣẹ,
Scarlet
While reviewing notes for Beyond First Glance, I paused to read Sihle’s thoughtful review of Scarlet Yearnings: “Love doesn’t erase doubt. It just learns how to exist next to it.” That insight captures what I hoped to explore across these twelve stories, the complicated reality of loving, choosing, questioning, and living with the paths we take. Seeing a reader recognize that complexity reminds me why I write about love, family, and second chances without judgment. Help Scarlet Yearnings travel by requesting it at your local bookstore or library, or gifting it to a reader who is ready for it. Alternatively, get it:
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Last thing: I will be at even more NYC-based bookish events over the next few months! Come meet your favorite author: https://scarletibisjames.com/events.