Yas Queen

Tusiata Avia is an internationally acclaimed poet, and performer. She has published 4 collections of poetry and 5 children’s books. Her first book of poems, Wild Dogs Under My Skirt, was also adapted for the stage; most notably off-Broadway, where it took out the 2019 Fringe Encore Series Outstanding Production of the Year.

Tusiata was awarded a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to poetry and the arts in 2021. Her most recent book, The Savage Coloniser Book won the 2021 Best Book of Poetry at the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.

Maxine Beneba Clarke is the ABIA and Indie award winning author of the critically acclaimed short fiction collection Foreign Soil, the bestselling memoir The Hate Race, the Victorian Premier's Award winning poetry collection Carrying the World, and the Boston Globe/Horn Prize winning picture book The Patchwork Bike, illustrated by Van T. Rudd. She is the author and illustrator of the children's books Fashionista, and When We Say Black Lives Matter, and the editor of Best Australian Stories 2017, and the anthology Growing Up African in Australia. Her latest poetry collection is How Decent Folk Behave.