Bea's Book Blog: Details on Three Projects!

My first blog post for Bea’s Book Blog is about my three announced projects: a novel, a picture book, and a poem.

This is a picture of me holding up my binder for I'LL MAKE A SPECTACLE OF YOU research, notes, etc..

I’LL MAKE A SPECTACLE OF YOU is an adult Southern Gothic horror novel. It will be published this fall! Here is a link to the official pitch by my publisher, Run For It/Orbit/Hachette.

What that pitch won’t tell you is one of the book’s central questions: "What would you do for your community?” or, more specifically, “What sacrifices would you make to ensure the safety of your loved ones?” Both questions are particularly pointed and perhaps painful, given **gestures wildly**. However, as I’ve said aloud several times over the past year, it’s never been safe to be Black in America. We have had to be outrageously inventive, resourceful, and clever to survive. Yet, we have done so, and done so with courage and, often, humor.

Our communities are filled with music, spirituality, and passion—all of which you’ll find on the pages of SPECTACLE—but more than anything, I’ve wanted to instill the historic beauty of the Black community (specifically Southern Black Appalachian communities) and why someone would turn to violent and supernatural means to protect that which they love.

I’ll talk more about spirituality in the next blog post about SPECTACLE, which will discuss the (not released yet!) cover. Until then, what else the pitch won’t tell you is that Hoodoo and rootwork play an integral part in this story. The research I’ve done has been fulfilling. My beloved Hoodoo has renewed my imagination and reminded me of how imperative these stories are to be told, even, and perhaps especially, in fiction.

This is a picture of a highlighted page from my copy of Charley Pride's autobiography.

My picture book biography, CHARLEY’S HONKY TONK MISSION, is about Charley Pride, America’s first Black country music superstar. It will be published in early 2026. My publisher is Kokila/Penguin Random House.

Beyond that, as someone who grew up in East Tennessee, the birthplace of country music, I can confidently say that Charley Pride deserves several more books about him and his journey, blazing a path through 1960s and 1970s country music while generously pulling the ladder back down at every opportunity.

Fun fact: I wrote this picture book in the summer of 2023, and my agent and I submitted it to editors in October of that year. Imagine my surprise when, during the 2024 Super Bowl, BEYONCÉ drops “Texas Hold ‘Em” and “16 Carriages”. I was shook—it felt fated. There was now an undeniable, palpable hunger for Black country music and the recentering of Black southern and southwestern history. Reader…this is very specifically my shit.

This is the meme of Tiffany Pollard aka 'New York' shockingly saying, "BEYONCÉ?!"

During my research for CHARLEY’S HONKY TONK MISSION, (I highly recommend Charley’s autobiography—he’s funnier than you’d think!) I’ve learned there’s a straight line of inspiration from Jesse Owens (track superstar), Jackie Robinson (baseball superstar), to Charley Pride (country music superstar). Each man was inspired by the last. I would be here all day listing their achievements, but suffice it to say that representation matters, and we are all inspired by our surroundings, even those that are painful.

I’ll do another post when there’s a cover reveal. Until then, I recommend listening to “Kiss an Angel Good Mornin” by Charley Pride, “Backroad” by Tanner Adell, “Hit Dawg Will Holla” by The War And Treaty, and “look up” by Joy Oladokun.

This is a picture of me smiling, wearing a black short-sleeved jacket over a white tanktop.

Lastly, my eerie science fiction poem, I NAMED HER EYE, will be out in late 2025. Here is a link to the pre-order from FIYAH Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction.

I wrote this poem as an ode to Dorian Grey and a messed-up, cyberpunk future.

Fun fact: this poem is the first cyberpunk-adjacent thing I’ve ever written! It inspired me. Now, I’m watching cyberpunk media (Cowboy Bebop [2021], Westworld [1973 and 2016 versions], Black Mirror, Escape from New York, etc.). I am enjoying myself.

Of course, I now have several cyberpunk novel ideas in various age categories and on a wide spectrum from ‘soft cyberpunk’ to ‘cyberpunk horror.’ As science fiction sub-genres go, for me, cyberpunk has placed third, behind space western (2nd) and Afrofuturism (1st).

Please be on the lookout for FIYAH’s top-notch corresponding playlists.

My next blog post will be about the cover of I’LL MAKE A SPECTACLE OF YOU, which, I can say, is stunning.