Zenda Walker grew up a reader. “I was really into Judy Bloom books; lots of picture books, of course,” says the Grand Prize winner of the 29th WD Self-Published Book Awards. “And then there were just all these series of books for children, like The Baby-Sitters Club.” But it was the books she read as she got older—like Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye—that opened her eyes to what books can do for a person. “I thought, Wow, these books really have an ability to change your entire life, your perspective, and broaden your awareness.”
It is a culmination of that childhood love of reading and the books that helped mold her that led her to write , a story she hopes accomplishes two things for young Black girls today—foster a love
