My name is Kyra Ann Dawkins. I am a writer, an editor, a book reviewer, and an aspiring storyteller. My debut novel, The We and the They, published by New Degree Press in July 2020, is now available as an e-book, paperback, hardcover, and audiobook. I’m also currently writing First-Person Archer, a companion serial to The We and the They available on Kindle Vella.
I’m currently available for freelance writing and editing services.
I am a recent graduate from Columbia University in the City of New York, where I studied Medicine, Literature, and Society.
Much of my previous work, which are largely scholastic essays, opinion-editorials, and poems can be found in The Plain Dealer, the Columbia Daily Spectator, Quarto Magazine, The Columbia Witness, the Columbia Explorations in Global Language Justice Blog, the LILAS Wellness Blog, and the Columbia Oral History Masters in Arts Blog to name a few places. I have also had the pleasures of serving as Opinion-Editorial Deputy Editor for the Columbia Daily Spectator and of being a ghostwriter for prominent community leaders in the Greater Cleveland Area.
Though the future is continually an enigma to me, I hope my career will continue to evolve around writing, editing, and words at-large.
The We and the They is a book guided by oral tradition and rooted in collective identity.
I was compelled to write The We and the They because I wanted to create a narrative space where one could healthily escape the limits of individuality and experience a story as a member of a new collective.
Framing oneself as an individual all the time can be confusing, exhausting, and isolating. However, I know that I would not be who I am without the stories I’ve been told and communities that I’m a part of. I feel less alone and I am less nervous about who I am becoming when I remember the collectives that are already around me and join new diverse ones.
I hope that The We and the They is the kind of book that people will want to read aloud and discuss with one another. I want it to foster communal discussions about identity, grief, satisfaction, and legacy. It has always amazed me how much a narrative can bring people together, and I look forward to becoming closer to my readers through this story.
Also, The We and the They has recently won 3 Firebird Book Awards, taking first place in the Dystopian, Magical Realism, and Speculative Fiction categories.
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