Nicole Dennis-Benn

"I think what’s going on with this country is that Americans are now experiencing what it’s like to be an immigrant because it’s not the easiest decision to move away from your home land. And so when that decision is made it’s definitely because you’re fleeing something and hoping for the better, but still not wanting to cut ties with your country…"

"I feel like we’re constantly evolving as human beings, and there are usually epiphanies that happen. It doesn’t have to be the deepest darkest secrets but something that we didn’t know before, that we just discovered, and we’re like, “Oh. Wow,” and the world suddenly looks different…"

"I could not write properly until I owned every aspect of my identity - my identity as a lesbian woman, my identity as a black woman, my identity as a Jamaican woman, an immigrant, then also a working-class Jamaican woman..."

"Had I lived in Jamaica, I could not have been a writer…I wouldn't be courageous to challenge the issues that I challenge in my work, you know, especially homophobia, sexualization of our young girls, race, class, socioeconomic disparities. Being here in America gave me that opportunity…"