Valerie Boyd

With 18 years experience as a journalist, Boyd is also Arts Editor at The Atlanta Journal- Constitution-one of only a few African Americans supervising arts coverage at a major metropolitan daily.

An accomplished writer, editor, and cultural critic, Boyd has published work in numerous anthologies, magazines and newspapers. Her articles, essays and reviews have appeared in Step Into a World: A Global Anthology of the New Black Literature, Ms. Magazine, The Oxford American, Book magazine, The Washington Post, African American Review and other publications.

Boyd founded EightRock, a cutting-edge journal of African-American arts and culture, in 1990. In 1992, she co-founded HealthQuest, the nation's first nationally distributed magazine focusing on African-American health.

A member of the National Book Critics Circle, Boyd has a bachelor's degree in journalism from Northwestern University and an MFA in creative writing from Goucher College.

Boyd's book, Wrapped in Rainbows-the first biography of literary legend Zora Neale Thurston in 25 years-was published in January 2003 to enormous critical acclaim. It was hailed by Alice Walker as "magnificent" and "extraordinary"; by The Washington Post as "the definitive Hurston biography for many years to come"; by the Boston Globe as "elegant and exhilarating"; and by the Denver Post as "a rich, rich read."