BLACK QUEER LIT: THEN AND NOW

In recognition of Black History Month, join us as we remember the contributions of Black Queer writers past and present. Frederick L. Smith (Play It Forward) Sheree L. Greer (Let The Lover Be), Rebekah Weatherspoon (Treasure), and Fiona Zedde (Desire at Dawn) discuss their current novels--courtesy of Bold Stroke Books--as well as the past, present, and future of Black LGBTQ literature.

Originally from Detroit, Michigan, Frederick Smith is a graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism and Loyola University Chicago. He lives in Los Angeles and is also the author of Down for Whatever and Right Side of the Wrong Bed. Readers can contact him at www.FrederickLSmith.com.

A Milwaukee, Wisconsin native, Sheree L. Greer has been published in Hair Trigger, The Windy City Times, Reservoir, Fictionary, and the WindyCity Queer Anthology: Dispatches from the Third Coast. She has performed her work across selected venues in Milwaukee, New York, Miami, Chicago, and Tampa, where she hosts Oral Fixation, the only LGBTQ Open Mic series in TampaBay. She received a Union League of Chicago Civic Arts Foundation Award, earned her MFA at Columbia College Chicago, and currently teaches writing and literature at St. Petersburg College. Ms. Greer is an Astraea Lesbian Writers Fund grantee and completed a VONA residency at University of Miami. She recently published a short story collection, Once and Future Lovers and an excerpt from her novel What Has Never Been Taught appears in Best Lesbian Romance 2012.

After years of meddling in her friends’ love lives, Rebekah Weatherspoon turned to writing romance as a means to surviving a stressful professional life. She has worked in various positions from library assistant, meter maid, middle school teacher, B movie production assistant, reality show crew chauffeur, D movie producer, and her most fulfilling job to date, lube and harness specialist at an erotic boutique in West Hollywood. Her interests include Wonder Woman collectibles, cookies, James Taylor, quality hip-hop, football, American muscle cars, large breed dogs, and the ocean. When she’s not working, writing, reading, or sleeping, she is watching Ken Burns documentaries and cartoons or taking dance classes. If given the chance, she will cheat at UNO. She was raised in Southern New Hampshire and now lives in Southern California with an individual who is much more tech savvy than she ever will be. Member RWA.

Jamaican-born Fiona Zedde currently lives and writes in Atlanta, Georgia. She is the author of several novellas and novels of lesbian love and desire, including the Lambda Literary Award finalists Bliss and Every Dark Desire. Her novel, Dangerous Pleasures,was winner of the About.com Readers’ Choice Award for Best Lesbian Novel or Memoir of 2012. Her short fiction has appeared in various anthologies including the Cleis Press Best Lesbian Erotica series, Wicked: Sexy Tales of Legendary Lovers, Iridescence: Sensuous Shades of Lesbian Erotica, and Fist of the Spider Woman. Writing under the name "Fiona Lewis," she has also published a novel of young adult fiction called Dreaming in Color with Tiny Satchel Press. And as “Lindsay Evans,” she has written multiple novels for Harlequin Kimani Romance. Her latest novel, Desire at Dawn, is available now.

***Unfortunately our little podcast recording device ran out of digital space before this event reached completion.  We regret the omission but trust the listener will enjoy the hour of recorded material that is available***