When a Purple Rose Blooms

When a Purple Rose Blooms is more than a series of essays and poems. Jeneé Darden’s debut collection is a homegrown Oakland spellbook, a womanist battle cry, a spiritual incantation of Black joy, self-love and healing for contemporary African American sistren.
– Aya de León, Novelist and Director of Poetry for the People at UC Berkeley

A wealth of wisdom, humor, grit, warmth and sensuality. When a Purple Rose Blooms candidly shows a Black woman’s quest to embrace her entire self while navigating contemporary America. Very few works spit fire and water like this one. Darden gets to the core of what it means to feel without apology, love radically, and get Queened up while honoring the Queen in others as well.
– Lyndsey Ellis, Writer, Editor and Award Recipient of 2018 Barbara Deming Memorial Fund

Jeneé Darden’s When a Purple Rose Blooms is a daring book of poems and essays, depicting family, pop culture, self-love, racism and other issues, especially those that impact women. This truth-telling book heralds with allusions, historical references, blues, East Oakland, and intergenerational camaraderie, praise, and “God’s Image.” These poems and essays tell us what’s happening, and display much intelligence.
– Lenard D. Moore, author of The Geography of Jazz, Associate Professor of English at the University of Mount Olive