The First Book
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The First Book: Melissa Petro
In our culture, motherhood is presumably sanctified, and I thought I’d experience social acceptance beyond anything I’d ever imagined. Instead, I felt under constant surveillance and yet utterly invisible….
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The First Book: Yasmin Zaher
If I thought too much about audience, or audiences, I think I would encounter too many opposing demands and the writing would end up average.
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The First Book: Marcela Fuentes
I’m writing for anyone who likes a messy, drama-filled story with secrets and hilarious family problems, but also for my Latinx community.
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The First Book: Uche Okonkwo
Going out of one’s way to write what’s currently trendy, just because it’s trendy, can be counterproductive and take the pleasure out of writing.
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The First Book: Eddie Ahn
The themes in the book subsequently shaped the story’s chronology and created a different style of graphic storytelling, connecting my family’s history with my community work and service.
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The First Book: Armen Davoudian
I was attracted to those aspects of poetry where you can be in two places at once but also lost between them: rhyme, the pun, and “binary” forms like the sonnet.
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The First Book: Vanessa Chan
Ambition and achievement are great, but gratitude is the true source of joy.
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The First Book: Soraya Palmer
I thought about stories that saved me as a child by showing me what was possible. And then I thought about the stories that were missing.
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The First Book: A. Light Zachary
I gave up on “speaking truth to power” when I remembered our oppressors will never read my poetry.
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The First Book: Sebastián H. Páramo
I believe that’s what most writers want—to share an experience that adds complexity to life and resonates with something someone hasn’t been able to say yet.
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The First Book: Cory Allen
Believe in your story. Be persistent. Be creative and find ways around the roadblocks.
