The 'Kids Who Achieved Greatness' book series was planned years ago. The book series idea came after I finished the Alphabet City series which focuses on black people in the inner cities of America. While I did tackle a lot of social issues that plague the inner cities, I didn’t get to immerse myself in characters that young people can relate to. There was only Shameka and Jermaine in the Alphabet City series.
With “The Kids Who Achieved Greatness,” I wanted to delve into young characters in their early 20s who graduated college. With this book series, the goal was to shine light on young black adults reaching the pinnacle in their education but also shining light on what they had to experience in their young lives to get to graduation day.
The goal was definitely five books with four characters and then having the last book be of significant importance regarding social issues, what these characters learned about each other and themselves and the value of friendships in your life.
With that said, I did start the series with Yvonne who is a young woman from Memphis, Tennessee. She’s from the inner city and faced a lot to get to where she is. I will say a lot of the book I wrote in the moment, it wasn’t necessarily planned to write it the way I did.
I surely surprised myself with how I developed Yvonne and tackled some significant social issues that get swept under the rug in Black America. All I will say is, there are some chapters that are deep and hit hard and it will make you emotional. That’s the goal and the purpose but also to have uncomfortable conversations about what’s going on in the black community.
Yvonne is a character that most can relate to and while I did tackle some subject matter that’s sensitive, I didn’t want to carve her path in that direction. I utilize that with other characters in the series.
While Yvonne’s character was a straight path to college in some instances, there are mental, spiritual and emotional hurdles she has to overcome to get to where she is. The chapter “Adjustments” is a significant one along with two others that shines light on how we as young adults experience changes in life and it’s all in how we assimilate to our environments.
The journey of Yvonne’s life has its share of challenges that happen and hopefully the start of this book series is one for the memories and prompts readers to want to read the rest of the book series.
While the gameplay was to release the start of the series in February 2027, I feel with where I am currently in my writing journey, it was time to get back to publishing books. My last published book was in December 2024 and I haven’t written a book since the summer of 2023. So a two year hiatus from writing books (I was still writing these wonderful blogs and recording podcasts).
Hopefully you’ll take the time to read this book series and understand that everyone has a story and when we reach the top of the mountain, we should be happy and proud of ourselves with where we are in life.
That’s my blog for today, The Kids Who Achieved Greatness 1 is available on all major bookstores (except Amazon) and on Gumroad for ebooks. Paperbacks are available on The Bookpatch.
Be good, and go accomplish your goals!
Jamell Crouthers
Aquarianmind
Write a comment