May 28

MORE REASONS WHY I WROTE THIS BOOK

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I wondered if there was a way to write an interesting book about Black lesbians who lived during the 1920’ and 30s. I also wanted to tell the story of the first great migration of Black folks from an agricultural south to the industrial north. What must that like for Black women with elementary school educations and very little skills. Which states did these Black women relocate? What would make them leave home and go into the unknown north? How did these women fair in their newly adopted homes. I debated if this book I wanted to write should be an official history book or a fictional account. I’d read a couple of fictional books who did a good job of teaching a bit of actual history by blending in personal accounts. I wanted to write a similar book. I was curious what Black lesbian life was like in the Harlem of the 20s and 30s. I decided to do some research before I started writing “TYSON” a bittersweet tale of loyalty, murder and romance during Harlem’s Renaissance. My purpose was to write a fictional murder mystery that takes place during that time. What I discovered was nothing. There were […]
May 21

WHY I CHOOSE TO WRITE WHAT I WRITE

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I have always been a curious sort of person. I don’t mean curious as in odd or strange. Hmm, maybe I’m that too. But this time, I mean I’m a people-watcher. I can and have gone to a shopping center or sat on a wrought-iron park bench or settled on a concrete seat in a playground and watched pedestrians do whatever they do on the street all day. I’ve been known to spend a lunch hour or longer people-watching. Time just seems to fly by when I do it. I’m imagining what their lives might be like away from the shopping malls, parks, playgrounds, and lunchrooms, where I first see them. If I’m not close enough to hear their conversations, I make them up. I see a kid being disciplined by his nanny for jumping mid-way from the metal slide instead riding all the way down to the end. His jump barely misses hitting another kid’s head as she kneels next to the slide fixing a loose sneaker. I wonder what his mother and father do? They probably have a nice income to be able to afford a nanny. Then I wonder if the nanny is being paid under the […]
May 14

CAN I USE YOUR RESTROOM?

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I love my adopted city of New York. I believe that I always will. I do have one pet peeve, though. Actually, I have many peeves against the city living, but this one still bugs me whenever I see it happening on the street in public view. What I’m talking about is public exposure to the male genitalia. Years ago, when I first moved to New York, I couldn’t count the number of times I’d be returning from work late and I’d be walking up the street to my room. In the distance, I’d see a man leaning his forehead against the side of a building, his shoulders slightly hunched. Or he’d be leaning against a car with an arm resting on the car’s roof. I’d keep walking the same path because I didn’t understand what I was seeing. I’m from the country. Back home, men didn’t urinate in the street in full view of anybody using the street to go somewhere. Men kept their private parts private. In the 18 years I lived in Ohio, I can’t remember ever seeing a man or a boy urinating in full view of anybody. I’m sure we didn’t have more men’s rooms […]
May 07

SHOPLIFTING WHILE BLACK?

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I watched the Starbuck’s video of the police arresting the two young Black men charged and found guilty of being Black while hanging out in a place that allows it. The video had me thinking about my own experiences. I’m a baby boomer. I’m Black. I’m probably twice as old as the young men in the Starbuck video. I’ve probably had twice as many similar experiences as those young men have. I loved to sew. Years ago, I used to make all my own clothes and my son’s clothes until he was a pre-teenager. I sold the clothes I made, including jumpsuits, business suits, and handbags on consignment in small shops and street fairs. I also made quilts, slipcovers, and upholstered my existing furniture. On a regular basis I bought fabric and trimmings, which included zippers, snaps hooks & eyes, Velcro, fusible hemming material, buttons threads, and iron-on or sew-in interfacings. I’d usually go to my favorite neighborhood fabric stores or go to Delancey Street or West 38th and 39th between 7th and 8th Avenue in the Fashion District. I’d heard of a new store in the Fashion District that specialized in trimmings, handmade lace, piping, iron-on embroidery, decorative patches, […]
Apr 30

Tyson Book Description

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
How far would you go to honor a promise? READ Leonia’s story in TYSON. It will inspire you. TYSON, a sister’s love be limitless is a fictional whodunit written in the voice of a 27-year-old, southern “colored” woman, Leonia Gillette. She and her big brother, Tyson, come north to escape a drunken father who tried to rape her. They settle in Harlem in 1927 during the Harlem Renaissance and just before the Great Depression. In 1932, somebody castrates, then murders Tyson in a Harlem alleyway, supposedly as revenge for his unpaid gambling debts. Leonia doesn’t believe the police report and decides to investigate her brother’s death. Along the way to uncovering Tyson’s killer, Leonia introduces us to a cast of characters–good, bad, and very bad– found only in the Harlem of the thirties. “TYSON, a sister’s love be limitless” is available now on Amazon in print and on Kindle. ASIN: B0795Y11HG (Kindle Version $2.99) ISBN-13: 978-1983996634 (Print Version $13.99) ISBN-10: 1983996637 (Print Version $13.99) Here are the links for: TYSON, a sister’s love be limitless: Amazon Kindle USA: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0795Y11HG Amazon Kindle UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0795Y11HG Createspace: https://www.createspace.com/8021244 Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/782272 Book Trailer: https://youtu.be/PlGVVcusaz8 Book Trailer: https://youtu.be/FB7zA8kIeIg Ask David: http://askdavid.com/reviews/book/lesbian-murder-mystery/15796 Connect with BL Wilson […]
Apr 23

WHY I WROTE SARITA & IMANI

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
  I’ve read many books and seen movies about bad boys. How good girls, nice girls, and naïve girls love them bad, bad boys so much, they’ll do almost anything to get one and keep him. Hollywood’s version of “almost anything” usually includes the good girl deserting her lifelong girlfriends; estrangement from family members; especially estrangement her own children if she has any; and sometimes the good girl loses her job too. I decided that I wanted to explore that possibility. I also want to write about an aggressive; a top; a butch; a wild stud in other words, a bad girl character who was also gay. I wanted to explore why a woman might label herself as an aggressive or a butch dyke or a wild stud. In other words what makes a bad girl bad. What’s her family like? Does she have siblings? If she has siblings, how does she relate to them? Are her parents alive and active in her life? Does she have any children? Does she work? What kind of job would she have? What kind of woman does she find attractive. Is the society that created her just like everybody’s else world or is […]
Apr 09

WHY PEOPLE LIE

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
For most of my life, I’ve been curious about something that seems to be a human phenomenon. Little kids do it. Teenagers do it. And adults do it. Even Disney characters (think Pinocchio) do it. It’s called lying. Lately I find myself wondering why people do it. Most people make such a mess of it. They tell whoppers that can so easily be uncovered. In this age of cellphone videos, body cams, social media, and information breaches, who doesn’t know your business? To me, lying seems worthless or at least more work than it’s worth. Yet people still do it. And I keeping asking myself, why do people lie? Experts Victoria Talwar and Kang Lee say that there are three types of lies. The first one is called a primary lie. This type of lie is told to hide what the teller did but fails to consider the mental state of the listener. Children as young as two and as old as four tell these kinds of lies. By the time children are four, they learn to tell secondary lies. These lies are more plausible. The teller has learned through trial and error to shape the lie to the listener’s […]
Apr 02

Sarita & Imani

by B.L. in Latest Novels 0 comments
In Sarita & Imani, an erotic tale of lust, love, faith, & a princess a mysterious homeless woman has been hanging around social worker Sarita White’s office building. On her way to work, Sarita begins to offer the woman coffee and food and communicates with her in sign language, as Sarita discovers the woman is deaf. Sarita wants to help the woman find shelter, especially after she is victimized by local juveniles. After a particularly horrifying beating, Sarita rescues the woman from the marauding youths and brings her to her office. From there, life as Sarita knows it is turned upside down. She is drugged, kidnapped, and ends up on a tropical island, part of a wilderness adventure program under the strict rule of Commander Imani Abdullah, from which she may never recover. Will Imani turn Sarita away with her harsh and ruthless methods? Or will Sarita and Imani find true love as an island prophecy decrees? Find out in Sarita & Imani. Sarita & Imani, an erotic tale of lust, love, faith, & a princess is available for pre-order 3/16/18 on Kindle. The release date is 4/2/18. ASIN: B07BHWWKQH (Kindle Version $2.99) ISBN-13: 978-1986439237 (Print Version $13.99) ISBN-10: 1986439232 […]
Mar 11

BLACK WOMEN AS KRYPTONITE OR ARE THEY CANARIES IN THE COAL MINE?

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I keep thinking about a newscaster guest expert I watched. I believe it was on AM Joy’s show sometime in November of 2017, when MSNBC contributor Jason Johnson said Black women were kryptonite to the Trump administration. I think not. I believe Black women are “canaries in the coal mine.” Just as canaries warned coal miners when there were poisonous gases inside the mines by chirping until they died, Black women are issuing early warning signals that this country is in serious trouble. In April 2017, Mr. Johnson had written an article about Black women being natural enemies to the Republican party and to the Trump administration in particular. In the article, he mentioned how Susan Rice was used by the Republicans in the mini-unmasking scandal. Remember how Ms. Rice, as a part of her job as national security advisor, asked to unmask the names of Trump’s transition officials? She wanted the names revealed to find out who on Trump’s team was talking to Russian spies that were meddling in US elections. President Trump and his Republican allies tried to distract the public from the truth about Russian meddling in our elections. He replaced it with a trumped-up theory that […]
Feb 26

WHY I WROTE “TYSON, a sister’s love be limitless”

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I’ve always wondered what Black lesbian life was like in the Harlem of the 20s and 30s. I decided to do some research before I started writing “TYSON” a bittersweet tale of loyalty, murder and romance during Harlem’s Renaissance. My purpose was to write a fictional murder mystery that takes place during that time. What I discovered was nothing. There were volumes written about white gays and lesbians living in New York during that time but very little, usually one or two paragraphs sometimes an entire page or two about Black gay life in Harlem. I found even less information, mainly antidotal information about Black lesbians living during the time period I was interested in. I enjoyed the research I’ve done on the subject of Black lesbians of Harlem in the 20s and 30s. Back in 2003, when I began researching this novel, I worked full time for the city so I did research at local libraries, cultural organizations like Herstory (lesbian archives) in Brooklyn, the LGBT Community Center’s historical collections at 13th Street in lower Manhattan, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture on 135th Street and Malcolm X Blvd after work and on weekends. I should also mention […]
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