A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brontez Purnell is a writer, musician, dancer, filmmaker, and performance artist. He is the author of a graphic novel, a novella, a children’s book, and the novel Since I Laid My Burden Down. The recipient of a 2018 Whiting Award for Fiction, he was named one of the thirty-two Black Male Writers for Our Time by T: The New York Times Style Magazine in 2018. Purnell is also the frontman for the band the Younger Lovers, the cofounder of the experimental dance group the Brontez Purnell Dance Company, the creator of the renowned cult zine Fag School, and the director of several short films, music videos, and, most recently, the documentary Unstoppable Feat: The Dances of Ed Mock. Born in Triana, Alabama, he has lived in Oakland, California, for more than a decade. You can sign up for email updates here.