Derrick Barnes is a National Book Award Finalist for his 2022 graphic novel Victory. Stand!-Raising My Fist For Justice, which also won the 2023 YALSA Excellence in Young Adult Nonfiction Award, and a Coretta Scott King Award Author Honor.

“Derrick Barnes brings a fresh perspective to literature as he writes about the emotional, social, and cultural collisions of young people and the difficulties and rewards of each when they remain true to their beliefs. This is a text that young people will appreciate.

Derrick, I am currently running a Superhero Play Therapy Group at my agency (Westchester Jewish Community Services in Mount Vernon NY) and using your book Like Lava in My Veins to discuss emotions, learn about self regulation, and recognize their own strengths.

(Click to check out my interactive flyer.) Availability and Honorariums Please contact Carmen Oliver for honorarium rates, additional presentation details and availability. That's right. I will come to you. Whether it be a half day school visit, whole day, conference, library presentation, panel----I'll be there. To order bulk copies of my titles for your event…

Jun 16, 2014 · Barnes brother Solo tagged along with me last week when I took my mother to the eye clinic for a minor procedure. We came early. There were at least eight other people in the room, waiting in silence, reading magazine articles.

2020 January 28 Howard Middle School Orangeburg, South Carolina January 31 Florida Gulf Coast University Literary Festival Fort Myers, Florida February 1 African American Children's Book Fair Philadelphia, Pennsylvania February 7-9 SCBWI Mid Winter Conference New York, New York February 11 Washington Street Elementary Hartsville, SC February 15 LRSD 21st CCLC Little Rock, Arkansas…

By Derrick Barnes / Jan 13, 2016 / Leave a comment Bonita-Bonita-Bonita You haven’t lived until you’ve looked into the rear view mirror of your mini van , and witnessed, in unison, four Black boys nodding and reciting that refrain, mimicking the lyrics …

BB-ism #2 When Pretty Boy McCoy was in the fourth grade, his teacher flagged me down after school and told me that the eldest Barnes brother had a piss-poor day. He was behaving like a follower, was involved in various scenes of silliness and mischief, or what I would call, ‘unnecessary coonery’,…

By Derrick Barnes / Sep 30, 2015 / Leave a comment. September 29, 2015. You may not know this, but I use to be an MC. An ‘ill’ MC. My rhymes, my delivery, my wordplay were masterful (I guess back then I would have said funky fresh or dope,right? Educated Negroes…)

By Derrick Barnes Mar 10, 2016 / Leave a comment In February of 2015, my wife and I noticed that the boys were not talking about any looming Black History month material from the elementary school we enrolled them in when we arrived here in Charlotte.