What is your role at Slant'd?

HBIC! All jokes aside, I'm the founding EIC and my 2 focus areas this year are to help breathe life into our books imprint and to invest in building community with our major donors (that could be YOU!).

If you want to make a bigger impact on Slant'd and the future of AAPI publishing, don't be shy about emailing me at [email protected] 😉

In the year of the snake, what narrative, perspective or publishing industry norm related to the AAPI community would you like to see evolve or transform?

We get asked all the time if people have to submit stories about the AAPI experience—but I truly believe that if it's a story BY an Asian American or Pacific Islander, then that's enough. That mindset is central to all of our publications. As we enter this new chapter as a publishing house, I'm excited to subvert what's expected of authors of color. The beauty of being an AAPI publisher is that we don't have quotas -- the pie is big enough for all of us. At Slant'd, our community is free to publish whatever stories make their heart sing, not just the stories that their agents and traditional houses deem worthy of being told / sold.

More specifically: I'm excited that we'll be publishing children's books that have nothing to do with being AAPI. If people can publish books about dragons eating tacos, then our community can publish whatever we want!