When was it? Where was it?

Now, I've been trying to think about this.

I am not...

Generally, holiday person.

At all? I'm a bit of a workaholic, which I've been trying to.

And also, I live on the beach.

Well, you live in Brighton.

Do you like a read or is it a busman's for you?

So when you wrote the first book then, you didn't know you were writing a series?

Oh, no, not at all.

Years ago, I wrote The Ice Cream Girls.

That was back in 2010.

And then I had the great idea of writing the sequel in 2020 with all that stuff that happened then.

And it was so hard.

And I was like, I'm never doing this again.

So if anybody is thinking, could you tell the listeners a little bit more about the prize and how they would go about entering?

I had to

remember this crazy story that you wrote that was set in America, never been to America, all these dramas that had happened.

But yeah, as time went on and trying to get published and just getting rejected constantly because I was writing about black women who were quirky and the love interest and we didn't, I wasn't writing about black trauma.

And so I was told that I was writing a book about black women, not the black experience and I was like so what's the black experience I don't know what that is um so but I had to keep showing up and doing what I wanted to do and writing the type of books that I wanted to write so that um so that other people can see actually that you can black women are in all these spaces and we are the love interest we are the kooky one we are the um the hero of the story rather than just being the constant sidekick or the

And what would you say about defining and changing the stereotype for negative narratives?

I think...

Being authentic is absolutely the the main thing, but also realizing that people out there need to see you living authentically and they people go off what you do and.

if you spend your time trying to people please or trying to fit into every single space because you're not for every single space you are literally for certain spaces and one of the things i love to do is to help people behind the scenes i sort of mentor people talk to people an hour a week on the phone sort of talk about their books and stuff like that people don't know i do this but i do it because i want to help people come up i want to help bring people up um as much as i can and helping other people, creating a community that shows up for each other and for the world, as it were.

[laughs]

I don't think you ever will.

No, I am lovely.

As Kez says, you know, I'm a really nice person.

I don't know why people don't like me.

But, you know, sometimes you, you can't just sit down and let people say whatever they want, and y- you do.

Like, Kez's motto a lot of the time is, "Leaving it is not an option." You know, sometimes you do want to just step away, but you have to stand up and be counted.

Yeah.