'Da Baddest' Is Out... Now what?

I've crossed the biggest item on my career bucket list off and, unfortunately, it didn't make me wealthy enough to retire and play with me pussy all day.

I promised myself that I wasn’t going to use this space to write about writing. Getting coherent words and stories onto a page is a complicated process that writers don’t have nearly as much control over as we’d like. That’s why I try not to bore you all with long passages about how long it’s been since I last posted, and all that jazz.  It’s a genre. The girls that get it, get it. But I’m making an exception today because it’s pub day for Trina’s memoir, Da Baddest. This book, that I co-wrote with her, finally making it onto shelves marks the end of a three-year journey for a project that I’ve dreamt about since I was in undergrad. 

Back in those days, I used to say that I wanted to write Trina’s biography as a precarious college student with a fledgling sense of my own capabilities as a writer. This was before I ever met a media professional. I had no clue how writing could fit into my life beyond mere hobby. By naming the person whose story I thought I was most suited to tell, I was imagining a lane for and defining success for myself in a career path I didn’t know existed. It was on brand. Who else was writing for Black girls outside of the academy? Outside of entertainment? Outside of fiction? At the same time? I was lost, and I’ll be damned if I didn’t fuck around and find out.

During the personal narrative op-ed wave of the early 2010’s (who remembers xojane.com?), the articles I wrote about Black women in pop culture helped launch my media career. I fought to bring Black lens to Refinery29 when I colluded with my work homegirls to launch Unbothered. I coined and wrote a definitive text on trap feminism. People pay me to come talk about it at universities and conferences. I launched this Substack to keep that framework active and relevant. I started the only podcast exclusively about female and queer rap. And as of today, I co-penned a memoir with the female rapper who is the sole reason “bad bitch” is a term of reverence. 

Now what?!