#WeNeedDiverseBooks
I decided a few years ago to write a book series for males
under the pen name P. Boyd. I did this to make sure that boys didn’t reject the
book simply because the author happens to be female. My focus in penning this series
was to ensure that African American males had contemporary stories about their
childhood. They needed something positive to speak to their experience about
being children in an ever changing world. At the time, I found no books that
included young black males as characters willing to change their environment
for the better. In short, my aim was to target the middle ground in literature
where reality meets fiction. The result was a story that was crafted to include
two African American male characters that decided to open up a detective
agency. Their goal was to solve the petty crimes in the neighborhood. I wanted
to craft the characters are brilliant, ingenious, ambitious, and curious. Some
readers of this blog may wonder why I wrote this series. My answer is simple.
In order to any child to believe they are worthy, they must be confirmed
through the experiences they read about at school. Black males are no
different. In order for black males to be confirmed as brilliant, driven, and
ingenious, they must have those experiences confirmed in the literature.
Happy Reading!
Tiffany A. Flowers, Children’s Author
