I finished my first Ireland story on Monday! I’m not happy with the title, “Samhain in St. Kitts,” but it’ll do for now. I’ve been working on the author’s note, which is stalled so I thought I’d post it in here to encourage me to finish it up. I’m writing it more for myself than for kids, I think, theorizing what I’m now calling my “Sankofa series” of stories that blend Black history and fantasy. That pretty much describes every novel I’ve written over the past twenty+ years, starting with A Wish After Midnight, but I think of these stories set in Ireland and Scotland as somehow different—they ..read more

Want to support children in conflict zones? Then head over to the auction site for #KidLit4Ceasefire! There are over 300 items you can bid on, including a one-hour virtual author visit with me. Normally that would cost over a thousand dollars but right now, bidding starts at $45…a great gift for a school that might not otherwise be able to afford a book talk. The money raised goes to charities in Gaza, Sudan, the Congo, and to support clean water in Flint, MI. You can bid on signed books, manuscript critiques, book swag—please take a minute to check it out! The news can make us feel powerless ..read more

Yesterday’s tarot card urged me to rest but after sleeping for sixteen hours on Tuesday, I think I’m good. I returned from Dublin on Monday night and started sorting my many receipts. Then I emailed the National Library of Ireland and asked for a copy of The Dublin Mercury from August 1768 so I could see the original advertisement I learned about earlier this month. It’s unsettling to see a child listed for sale in between banal notices about “exotic” trees and shrubs and some jilted husband refusing to pay for his wife’s expenses. One trafficker was clearly based in Dublin but the other seems ..read more

My head is full of threads and I’m slowly weaving them into a new story…there’s space to dream because I finished The Oracle’s Door on Monday! It’s with two editors but I’m trying not to think about that and I’m still prepared to self-publish if necessary. When I finish a novel, I often fall into a slump so I preempted that by diving into my research on Blacks in Ireland. I leave for Glasgow next week; I’ll teach a writing workshop the night of the 7th and then leave the next day for Dublin. So far I’ve lined up a school visit and a tour of Tipperary; Cork seems to have a connection to the Car ..read more

Happy New Year and Happy Book Birthday to The War of the Witches! It has been a long journey but we have finally reached the end of Jaxon’s magical adventure! I’m having a low-key kind of launch. No parties or cake, but I did make a short video which you can watch here. With so many conflict zones around the world, I’m a little uneasy promoting a book that has the word “war” in the title. But I wrote resistance to war into the novel and I hope the book can serve as an opportunity for kids and adults to talk about what it means to be a peacemaker. My fellow Canadian kid lit author Uma Krishnasw ..read more

My latest newsletter went out last week (you can read it here). I’ve considered hiring a virtual assistant to do the tedious tasks that take up so much time—like putting content on social media and sending out quarterly newsletters. But a couple of years ago I hired an accountant to do my taxes and I still spent at least a day gathering receipts and adding up the numbers; then I paid her $500 to take those figures and plug them into tax preparation software, which I could have done by myself for half the price. I’m only putting out newsletters twice a year and that seems sufficient; I don’t bl ..read more

It took a while for us to reach the end but we’re almost at the finish line…Book 5 in the DRAGONS IN A BAG series will be published in January 2024! I didn’t do a big cover reveal but Katelan Thomas did a great job–front and back: We’ve got Jax, Ma, and Sis on the front…and Ranadahy/Ol-Korrok battling the Scourge on the back: You can pre-order your copy here. It’s been a rocky ride at times but I’m so thankful for all the readers who kept this series alive. We’re nearing half a million copies sold! I’m deep into my Scotland stories right now, hoping to have both Blue Boy and The Ship in the Ga ..read more

I met with a psychic for the first time last week. It’s something I’ve always wanted to try, and there’s a shop around the corner with one of those neon palms in the window advertising $10 readings. An Ifa priestess reached out to me on Instagram saying she’d been contacted by my guides but there are a lot of scams on IG so I didn’t respond. But when a friend mentioned that she found a psychic through her cousin, I figured the woman must be legit. I often write about ghosts and believe I saw one as a child so despite childhood warnings from my mother to avoid ouija boards, I made an appointmen ..read more

In 2020, I wrote a poem for Juneteenth, which was later acquired by LBYR; our picture book, A Song for Juneteenth, was meant to come out last month but in March we learned that the illustrator had been arrested and so everything changed. The publication date has now been pushed to 2026 and award-winning illustrator Noa Denmon will be generating new art. Last year I wrote another poem for Juneteenth; I included it in Perennial and thought I’d share it today. It’s a tricky holiday for me…and one I’ve never celebrated. I’m writing another difficult poem today, hoping to clear some things before t ..read more

Last week I baked a cake for myself for my 51st birthday. Today I went for a run for the first time in three weeks…then I came home and baked another cake! Definitely stress-eating. I should blog more often because my head has been full and my heart has been heavy. Now someone’s trying to start something with me on Instagram but I’m not taking the bait. The numbers given by anti-racist scholar Ibram X. Kendi (left) have gone up because the bombing of Gaza hasn’t stopped. October is over so I’m no longer writing a poem a day but I did start a new picture book this morning. What can I offer the ..read more