A collection of African-American Same Gender Loving Literature featuring both new and established writers. Grounded in a poignant and truthful sensibility, imbued with the realities of sex and love, Smith and Williams present a culmination of poems, short stories, radical essays, sermons, plays and interviews honoring notable figures within the SGLBT community.

In this wrenching and spiritual collection, Darius Omar Williams takes a closer look at the institution of the black church using a specific language to highlight the joy, pain, highs and lows of sexuality, disease, homophobia, spiritual elitism and pre-mature death. With titles including "Blessed Assurance," "Rapture" and "Look at Your Neighbor," these poems chart the sexual and spiritual terrain of black gay experience in a confessional, blunt and praise-filled voice. Blending southern black church tradition with contemporary black gay culture, Williams's poems are fresh, original and long overdue.

100 imagination-stretching writing exercises inspired by the idea of creative constraints, from the author of The Making of a Story. When you are facing down a blank page (or screen), a constraint-based prompt—for example, “you must use the words ‘cloud’ and ‘green’” or “you must set the scene in a crowded grocery store”—can get your brain working in unexpected ways. In this creative writing guide, longtime teacher and novelist Alice LaPlante shares 100 original exercises that will simultaneously push you into a corner and give you the tools to write yourself out of it. LaPlante explains the purpose of each exercise—to sharpen your ear for dialogue, generate surprising images, or access intense emotions—and breaks down student examples to reveal how to achieve these goals. Whether you are looking to jumpstart new ideas or find a fresh angle on a work in progress, and whether you write fiction, creative nonfiction, or poetry, Write Yourself Out of a Corner will strengthen your imagination and your craft.

Silk Electric is a moving collection of poems exploring the conflict between spiritual, sexual and sacred spaces, while also juxtaposing the life of Diana Ross with black gay culture. Here is a new southern poet from Mississippi who exposes his soul through a candid, vulnerable account of his same gender loving self. Silk Electric searches for love in its most ideal form, but also reflects on love lessons from the past. Darius simultaneously takes you to church, the bedroom, the club, the bathhouse and the street corner all in one collection. Finally, Silk Electric is a celebration of the music of Diana Ross, a salute to civil rights activists including Medgar Evers, Beah Richards and Ossie Davis as well as a tribute to biological mamas, spiritual mamas and infamous drag-queens.

The Advocate is a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) monthly newsmagazine. Established in 1967, it is the oldest continuing LGBT publication in the United States.

Where Did Our Love Go?, an anthology of essays written by many major public figures and celebrities, will explore the substantive issues related to marital problem in the African-American community. From the "my baby's mama" syndrome to the more serious implications of what a generation of single-parent households will mean to future generations, this comprehensive collection will provide an in-depth discourse on the trends and issues that have caused the problematic behaviors within African-American relationships to persist with little sign of relief. The book will consist of a total of 40 essays divided equally into 4 lifestyle categories (single, married, divorced, and widowed), to present a wide cross section of perspectives on this subject. Marriage plays an essential role in maintaining the vitality and character of a community, so it is deeply unsettling for many African Americans to find that the value of this institution has lost its allure. While marriage among African Americans has always fallen below the average of other population segments, the gap today has grown so pronounced that the subject has sparked an intense national dialogue. A 2006 Washington Post article, “Is Marriage for White People,” created waves of controversy on the issue. In 2010, Nightline dedicated an entire broadcast to this growing crisis. The marriage gap in Black America has become such an open secret that it’s now the source of endless bad jokes and prime time reality shows. The statistics even back this up, as according to the U.S. Census, 43.3% of black men and 41.9% of black women in America have never been married, and the rate of decline is nearly twice the national average. Marriage is a rite of passage that is fundamental to every culture, which underscores the tremendous need for an active dialogue to take place that will lay a foundation for discovery. With essays from 50 Cent, Viola Davis, Jabari Asim, Darnell Williams, Faith Evans, Mara Brock Akil, and more, Where Did Our Love Go? will ignite the fight for that conversation to begin.

Fashioning Lives combines analysis of archival documents, literature, and film with the experiences of contemporary Black Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) individuals to demonstrate the usefulness of literacy as a historical and sociological lens for examining black queer cultural production and consumption. In addition, Eric Darnell Pritchard provides a theoretical framework for future analysis of the intersections of race and queerness in literacy, composition, and rhetoric.