YA author and poet, Zarina Macha, answers questions about her writing and being a black authortuber, including, “How do you approach difficult topics in writing?” [0:53]
She responds to this question, as to others, with a straight-faced tongue-in-cheek irreverence that would have you flat out laughing if the issues she brings up weren’t so serious. Or maybe you are laughing. Psycho. Not to worry, Zarina’s first novel was titled Every Last Psycho.
Here’s her response to the difficult topics question; “In writing my first published novel, Every Last Psycho, includes themes of rape, drug abuse, psychopathy, murder, and schizophrenia.”
She continues, “My second novel and third published book, Anne, includes themes of domestic violence, sexual coercion, alcoholism, bullying, and, have I left anything out? Oh yeah, panic attacks.”
“My third novel and fifth published book, Around Midnight, is about an emotionally abusive relationship between a girl and guy in their late teens. Oh, and my Kirk University books also include characters who struggle with mental and physical difficulties such as OCD, ADHD, and partial color blindness, so obviously my approach to difficult topics is to dive straight in because I really don’t give a damn. I believe that life is tough and it’s worth writing about tough topics rather than shying away from them. I do my best to portray mental health conditions in as honest a way as possible.
Zarina’s Kirk University romance series is written under the pen name Diana Vale.
We can’t get over how effortlessly funny Zarina is. Take, for instance, her response to the question; “What season do you prefer to write in?” [2:34].
“Oh honey, obviously the winter time as when the sun is all hot, all I want to do is go outside swimming. I couldn’t swim while there was a pandemic, [*FAKE CRYING*] it’s so sad. But seriously, I love writing, any time of the year, any day, anywhere. A bit like sex, only my writing sessions last longer.”
Question 5 is also worth noting [2:55]: “What would you tell other black authortubers that you wish other black authotubers had told you, a black authortuber?”
We think she got the point at the first mention of black author tuber, but anyhoo, here’s her response; “I would honestly just say not to let the color of your skin define you. I don’t see being black as a defining characteristic or a large part of my identity.”
Before you start calling Zarina out, she does add an additional point to her answer; “However, I do recognize, of course, that the rest of the world does not always see this, especially as I am mixed race and grew up with an incredibly racially diverse family in the incredibly racially diverse city of London. I really think that getting hung up on the color of your skin does not do you or anyone any favors. You can grovel about things or you can try and turn them to your advantage and I think an excellent example of someone who’s done this is Mr Spike Lee.”
“He is an African American film director who has produced a plethora of movies about the African American community which I think is a perfect example of someone turning and their disadvantage to their advantage.”
I also created a black authortube video [this one] where I compiled a bunch of questions from black authortubers into a video. Obviously. And this is my personal way of bringing us up so that we can have a larger voice in the community of authors on YouTube, known as authortube.”
On black authors who have influenced her [4:36], she mentions Malorie Blackman whose Noughts and Crosses series was a childhood favorite of Zarina’s.
She also mentions On Beauty by Zadie Smith, who is also a mixed-race British author. She says, “It it’s a fun and straightforward book and I recommend it to all who enjoy contemporary dramas about family dynamics that also ask questions about race, class, sexuality, religion, family, art, and society.
Another question about writing while black that she tackles is; “What mistakes do you think the black writing community makes when it comes to dealing with each other?” [5:20]
She moves the answer onto the broader field of the black community at large; “I’m not sure exactly about the black writing community, but I do think the black community in general needs to develop more solidarity among one another. There is a lot of anguish and I saw heaps of it growing up. Light skin versus dark skin. African versus Caribbean. And black people who sound posh or white being alienated by other black people. I think that we should just treat our fellow humans with compassion and stop seeing each other so defined as black or white. Obviously we can’t ignore color completely as that would be naive, but we can learn to see each other as people…”
