Building my own foundation.

Six years ago, I received the above ask on Tumblr. I received a lot of asks on Tumblr—many in a similarly kind vein—but I saw this on Timehop today, and it made me smile. If you’re unfamiliar with fandom and ships, or Tumblr, for that matter, this may seem like gibberish to you, but believe me when I say it’s a privilege to have strangers reach out just to say they enjoy what are essentially first drafts of your work.

As many know, fanfiction is what really nurtured my relationship with creative writing. It may sound silly, but that’s okay. For me, it’s (largely) the reason I’m pursuing traditional publishing. The seed was planted here. On Tumblr. With the support of a lot of women, mainly Black, with nothing but this little fandom in common, who saw my potential and encouraged me to see it, too.

I started querying my current manuscript in 2020. After a number of starts, pauses, and restarts, I’ve miraculously spent the last year moving steadily toward my goal of publishing original fiction. It’s been a long process, equal parts exhilarating, enlightening, and frustrating. But I’m getting there. And I think I’d like to talk about that here, at least occasionally. Is that interesting? Is that useful to anyone but me?

I don’t know. I guess we’ll find out.

In the meantime…