When I wouldn't leave home without my blue contacts or when I was bleaching my hair, I didn't have the language to articulate that I was trying to assimilate to whiteness. If anything, I was trying to "look normal."

I think white artists have a responsibility to be not only naming white supremacy, but to be using their power and privilege to support artists of color.

I don't yet know what style will be required for my next novel, but my sense is that each book will involve a new relationship to language.

I always work with text orally in the writing process, saying passages aloud to measure flow.

I recently did a reading at an elementary school in Ottawa, and one of the children asked me if I was a girl. I said yes. Another child commented that I had a deep voice. I responded: "Can girls have deep voices?" There was a pause and then the group responded, "Yes!"

I am more likely to get paid for my art if it's presented alongside a white artist, so the questions around value and agency arise: What choices should I make, or do I have to make, if I want to be compensated for my work? Why isn't my art valued on its own?

I do use art as a site of protest, particularly in relation to dominant narratives.