The Romance Novels
I publish
will never win
a Nobel Prize in Literature.
They are unlikely,
due to their covers,
to appear
on the
New York Times Bestseller List.
Literary critics won’t gush
over them.
And that’s okay.
I’m not writing these books
for them.
I’m writing these books
for Romance Readers
and they DO love them.
“I clearly believe that
I’m ignored in Hollywood,
for sure.
And that’s fine.
I get it.
My audience and
the stories that I tell
are African-American stories
specific to a certain audience,
specific to a certain group
of people that I know,
that I grew up,
and we speak a language.
Hollywood doesn’t necessarily
speak the language.
A lot of critics don’t
speak that language.
So, to them,
it’s like,
‘What is this?’”
“But I know
what I do is important.
I know what I do
touches millions of people
around the world.
I know how important
every word, every joke,
every laugh [is].
I know what that does
for the people
where I come from
and the people that I’m writing for.
So, yeah, I get that.”
Know who you’re creating for.
Make THEM happy
and disregard everyone else.