So many black kids are put in that position, so I wanted to show that there is no one way to talk black. There is a stereotype that if you sound ghet… - Angie Thomas

I'm okay with people saying “oh the language makes me uncomfortable,” but if the language is what makes you uncomfortable, consider yourself privileged. I'm more uncomfortable about the killing of unarmed black people in this country.

If nothing else, fiction has empowered a lot of people in the act of resistance. The Hate U Give, I know, has birthed several young activists and I’m so happy with that, I’m so proud these young people have decided to speak up and speak out on things that concern them. There was one young lady in Texas, it started out with her deciding she was going to speak up for the book when it was challenged by the school district. And that led to her becoming an activist in her own right in other areas. So I think books can empower. Rudine Sims Bishop [the author and educator] says that books are either mirrors, windows or sliding-glass doors, and that’s important in the act of resistance. You need that mirror to see yourself, to know what you can be and know what you are. And then you need that window to see into someone else’s life so you can understand what’s happening around you in the world that you may not notice at first glance. And you need the sliding-glass door so that you can step into someone else’s life and walk in with some empathy and use that empathy to make yourself heard. So yeah, I think books play a huge role in resistance. They play a huge role in opening people’s eyes and they’re a form of activism in their own right, in the fact that they do empower people and show others the lives of people who may not be like themselves."

I compare Bri and Starr to Biggie and Tupac…Without the beef! Tupac was very community-orientated, and that’s how Starr is. But Bri, similar to Biggie, she’s about making it, she’s about seeing her dreams come to life. She’s about trying to save her family, and there’s nothing wrong with that. So that’s where they’re different, but they’re similar in the fact that they are both powerful young women who know they have voices, and they both understand how they can use those voices to affect an entire generation.