Third Thursday Member Meeting

Writing Diverse Stories

Thursday, February 15, 2024, 6:00 pm
Danville Congregational Church

Our February program included an excellent presentation by Krystal Song, an AAUW Fund Fellow and an award-winning author, who spoke about how she became a writer of stories and novels for children, young adults, and adults. Krystal talked about having early access to a library as a child, and loving books and reading throughout her childhood. She started writing at an early age, and because she only saw white children in the books that she was reading, she thought that to be a writer of children’s literature meant writing about white children.

Krystal made the compelling case for having diverse representation in media, so that children especially can see themselves in what is published. Krystal spoke about the challenges of publishing as a woman of color in a world where the diversity of published authors is low.  Krystal joined us by Zoom from Stanford, which brought her larger-than life into our Third Thursday meeting space.

In order to make a difference, Krystal encouraged us to:

• Support marginalized authors by reading diverse literature
  • even if outside your typical genre
  • or from an author you’ve never heard of before
• Review your favorite books online on sites like Amazon or Goodreads!
• Buy from independent bookstores, or borrow and request books from your local library

You can learn more about Kyrstal at this link.