EpicReads presents an evening with YA authors Ben Philippe (Charming as a Verb), Justin A. Reynolds (Early Departures), and Lamar Giles (Not So Pure and Simple) as they discuss what it means to write about and represent Black Boy Joy in their novels. Moderator Damon Young (What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker) joins to discuss these themes.

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Justin A. Reynolds has always wanted to be a writer. Opposite of Always, his debut novel, was an Indies Introduce selection and a School Library Journal Best Book, has been translated into seventeen languages, and is being developed for film with Paramount Players. He lives in northeast Ohio with his family. You can find him at www.justinareynolds.com.

Lamar Gileswrites stories for middle grade, teens, and adults. In addition to Fake ID and Endangered for Harper, he writes for Scholastic (Overturned and Spin) and The Last Last-Day-of-Summer for Versify (HMH). He is a Virginia native, a Hopewell High Blue Devil, and an Old Dominion University Monarch. He resides in Chesapeake, Virginia, with his wife. Learn more about him at www.lrgiles.com.

Ben Philippeis a New York–based writer and screenwriter, born in Haiti and raised in Montreal, Canada. He has a Bachelor of Arts from Columbia University and an MFA in fiction and screenwriting from the Michener Center for Writers in Austin, Texas. He also teaches screenwriting at Columbia University. He is the author of Field Guide to the North American Teenager. He can be found online at www.benphilippe.com.

Damon Young is a writer, critic, humorist, satirist. His debut memoir -- What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker: A Memoir In Essays is a tragicomic exploration of the angsts, anxieties, and absurdities of existing while black in America, and won Barnes & Noble's 2019 Discover Award. It was also longlisted for the PEN America Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award, nominated for both an NAACP Image Award and a Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and is a Krause Essay Prize nominee. NPR, which named it one of the best books of 2019, called it an "outstanding collection of nonfiction."

He's also the co-founder and editor in chief of VerySmartBrothas -- coined "the blackest thing that ever happened to the internet" by The Washington Post -- a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, and a columnist for GQ. Damon currently resides in Pittsburgh's Northside, with his wife and two children.