Happy Pride!
Many monthly celebrations and commemorations are meant to bring awareness to historical events, circumstances, or situations. This month: for those of us who are blessed to do so, we thank our fathers; in recent years, the popularity of recognizing Juneteenth increased and a new federal holiday was established in 2021; we enthusiastically welcome the first day of summer; and we celebrate the courageousness of Stonewall Inn patrons. On June 28, 1969, police raided the gay bar in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City and patrons had had enough. Their resistance helped catalyze a movement. As we celebrate Pride, let’s remember that our vigilance and voracity to protect everyone’s freedom, dignity, and humanity even today, are still required.
So, we kicked off the celebration by participating in DC Black Pride and a Writer’s Forum hosted by Caged Birds Productions during Memorial Day weekend. It was an honor to share space with fellow LGBTQ+ authors. One of whom was George Johnson, author of All Boys Aren’t Blue. And yes, we fangirled him — for a guy who has enjoyed tremendous success, his humility was noteworthy. George’s commentary about having the second most banned book in the country was both inspiring and disturbing as he discussed the hate lobbed at him because of his memoir. Sadly, its impetus was the 2017 story of Giovanni Melton, a 14-year-old boy who was killed by his own father, in part for being gay.
We’re grateful for all the support we got at the Writer’s Forum – for the first time ever, we sold out of books!
Meet us at our next author event on Saturday, June 29 at the Woodlawn Community Reading Festival at Gwynn Oak Park in Woodlawn, Maryland from 11 am to 3 pm. Enjoy face painting, local vendors and authors, and other fun activities for readers of all ages.
June is also an excellent month to explore “new to you” LGBTQ+ authors and genres. The author Jae has made exploring easy with Pride Reads Celebration, a month-long event dedicated to bringing you daily sapphic books, giveaways, free ebooks, and discounted reads. And have you heard about the Queer Liberation Library? It’s exactly what its name implies, a free, digital library that makes literature and information available to its members. We hope you check it out.
Lastly, we would love to see some of your Pride pictures. Share them with us and we’ll share them (and least the tame ones) with our community.
Let’s celebrate!
Naomi
