WRITER, SPEAKER, ENTIRE MOOD.
Tricia Elam
a writer writing and other things…
Tricia Elam is an award-winning author, attorney and educator. Her first novel, Breathing Room, was published by Simon & Schuster/PocketBooks in 2001. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, Essence and other publications. She has provided commentary for NPR, CNN, the BBC and more. Tricia’s short stories are included in the O.Henry Prize Stories, New Stories from the South and other anthologies and her essays are published in Father’s Songs, Dream Me Home Safely, It’s All About Love and more.
As the venue’s 2018-19 visiting playwright, her plays, “Bold Moves” (4 short plays) and “With Glittering Eyes”, were produced by Hibernian Hall in Boston in 2018 and 2019
Her picture books, Nana Akua Goes to School and Dream Street were both published by Random House in 2020 and 2021 respectively. Nana Akua Goes to School won the 2021 Ezra Jack Keats writer award and the 2021 Children's Africana Book Award, among other accolades. Dream Street was named a NY Times 25 Best Children's Book selection for 2021. She also created a board book, Talk Baby Talk, published by Reach Out and Read in 2023.
Tricia, a “Roxbury girl” from MA, received her J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law and her MFA from University of Maryland. She is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Howard University in Washington, DC.
Tricia resides in Maryland where you can find her working on short stories, essays, another novel, more children’s books and plays.
