First Year, Community, and One Reads

Gloria is a Colombian American writer, translator, and advocate for multilingual literacy. She is the author of This is the Year, Your Biome Has Found You, and Danzirly, which won the Ambroggio Prize and the Gold Medal Florida Book Award. Her other honors include an Academy of American Poets Poet Laureate Fellowship, Hedgebrook Fellowship, being a Macondista, Highlights Foundation’s Diverse Verse Fellowship, Lumina’s Multilingual Writing Award, and a part of Las Musas. She is proud to be St. Pete's first Latina poet laureate. 

"Healing doesn't begin by hiding the truth. It begins when we’re brave enough to look at our history, speak it out loud, and use it to build something better—for our country and for our bloodlines."

Lee Hawkins is an American investigative journalist and author who was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2022. His most recent work, I Am Nobody’s Slave: How Uncovering My Family’s History Set Me Free, is an introspective journey into his family history, tracing its roots to pre-Revolutionary America.

Anthony R. Keith, Jr., Ph.D. (Tony) is a Black, gay spoken word artist, poet, and Hip-Hop educator. His debut, How the Boogeyman Became a Poet, is a powerful YA memoir in verse, tracing his journey from being a closeted gay Black teen battling poverty, racism, and homophobia to becoming an openly gay first-generation college student who finds freedom in poetry.

Annabelle Tometich went from medical-school reject to line cook to journalist to author. She spent 18 years as a food writer and restaurant critic for The News-Press in her hometown of Fort Myers, Florida. Her first book, The Mango Tree: A Memoir of Fruit, Florida, and Felony (2024, Little Brown) explores her relationship with her Filipina mother and was called “sweet, sharp” by The New York Times. 

Omkari L. Williams is the Gold Nautilus award-winning and bestselling author of Micro Activism: How You Can Make a Difference in the World (Without A Bullhorn). Her book helps readers identify their “activist archetype" and map a personal action plan for engaging in small, change-making activities with potentially big impacts.

Tiffany Jewell is a Black biracial writer, twin sister, first generation American, cisgender mama, anti-bias antiracist (ABAR) educator, and consultant. She is the author of the #1 New York Times and #1 Indie Bestseller, This Book Is Anti-Racist, a book for young folks and everyone to wake up, take action, and do the work of becoming antiracist.

"And maybe there is no nation or citizenry; they're just territories mapped in place of family, in place of love, the infinite country."

Patricia Engel is the author of, most recently, the story collection The Faraway World. Her novel Infinite Country was an instant New York Times Bestseller and a 2023 National Endowment for the Arts Big Read. Infinite Country is the winner of the New American Voices Award, was a finalist for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and was longlisted for the Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction.

Kai Harris is the author of the acclaimed debut novel What the Fireflies Knew (Tiny Reparations, 2022), a Silicon Valley 2023 Read, A Marie Claire Book Club pick as well as being an NAACP Image Award nominee and longlisted for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize. She is a writer and educator from Detroit, Michigan, who uses her voice to uplift the Black community through realistic fiction centered on the Black experience.

Susan Abulhawa speaks widely on the subjects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the power of storytelling, particularly for marginalized communities. She is one of the most widely-read Arab authors. Her debut novel, Mornings in Jenin, is a multigenerational family epic spanning five countries and more than sixty years. Susan is also the author of the critically acclaimed novels The Blue Between Sky and Water and Against the Loveless World.

Ladee is an award-winning author and scholar. Her critically-acclaimed novel, The Talented Ribkins, was awarded the 2018 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for the Debut Novel and the 2018 Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence, among many other honors, and garnered her an appearance on Seth Meyers.

Bridgett M. Davis is the author of the memoir, The World According To Fannie Davis: My Mother’s Life In The Detroit Numbers, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, a 2020 Michigan Notable Book, and named a Best Book of 2019 by Kirkus Reviews, BuzzFeed, NBC News and Parade Magazine. She is writing the screenplay for the film adaptation of the book, which will be produced by Plan B Entertainment and released by Searchlight Pictures.

Layla F. Saad is a New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author of Me and White Supremacy, anti-racism educator, international speaker, and podcast host on the topics of race, identity, leadership, personal transformation and social change.

Sequoia Nagamatsu is the author of the National Bestselling novel, How High We Go in the Dark (2022) as well as the story collection, Where We Go When All Is Gone. His novel was a finalist for the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize and shortlisted for the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize. It was also a Roxanne Gay Audacious Book Club Selection and 2022 Indie Next Pick.