Happy Valentine's Day, friends!

Valentine's Day has always been a day to celebrate love and life. This Valentine's Day feels heavy.

It has already been an incredibly difficult year and we are only just beginning. In order to survive the next four years, we cannot live in a state of perpetual fear and dread. We have to make joy for ourselves and loved ones.

Today, I am going to give you two simple ways to fight back against the Trump administration.

I want us to center love. Today, I want you to consider Indigenous love and how often you see Indigenous love represented in media. As you know, the first traditionally published Indigenous rom-com came out last year. Currently, it is the only Indigenous romance on shelves at bookstores. Imagine walking into a bookstore to buy a book in the genre you prefer, written by an author who shares your background and life experiences, and you had only one option.

What if I want an enemies to lovers? A friends to lovers? A rom-com or historical romance? Too bad. You get what you get. We need to change this. And it's going to take work to get there.

Every person deserves to see themselves represented on bookshelves.

Here's what you can do today:

Step One: Support Indigenous authors in publishing TODAY. Danica Nava, the author of The Truth According to Ember, the first traditionally published rom-com, has another book coming out this year! Love is a War Song is a love story about a pop star and a cowboy who couldn't be more different. I want you to pre-order this book today. You can do so by clicking the link below. If you cannot afford to pre-order today, request the book from your library.

Step Two: Upgrade your membership today. Help support the work that I do. As you may have heard me say, unlike many content creators, I am not getting continued offers for paid partnerships from traditional publishers. Even supporting at the $5 tier would help tremendously.

We are looking for our first Indigenous book to publish. Paid members to this community get a behind the scenes look at the publishing industry and get to participate in imprint decisions. (A great time to join, as I have an update to our search coming this weekend!). Paid members also are vital to growing our imprint. I would like to have enough paid members to be able to publish multiple books per year. I WANT AS MANY INDIGENOUS BOOKS ON THE SHELVES AS POSSIBLE and I know that you share this vision, too.

Today I'd like us to choose love by taking action towards making publishing more equitable.

<3 you,

Naomi