Welcome...This is who I am...

When you start a blog, there's really no true day one. You just start wherever you happen to be at the time. So as I start this blog, I'll try to give you some backstory. I'll give more as we go along.

My name is Lawrence C. Ross, Jr. I'm 39 years old, live in Inglewood, California with my wife and son.

I've been a paid and published writer for ten years. It all began when I started writing a free column for the National Newspapers Publisher Association (NNPA), a consortium of black newspapers. Basically, you write a column and then they distribute it to an assortment of newspapers. No pay, but you get published. Very, very important.

Next, I lucked up and got a job as a managing editor of a small hip hop magazine. Three thousand to five thousand word feature articles, and a year and a half of of drama capped that experience. But it was still valuable experience. It let me know that I wanted to write full time.

From there, it was two years at the Los Angeles Independent Newspapers. The LA Indy was a small operation that tried to tackle community stories the LA Times ignored. I covered everything from gay pride parades to city council meetings. Nothing was too small, and it was the absolute best place to learn how to write, and write under a deadline.

And it was then on to books: In 1997, I started writing a book called The Divine Nine: The History of African American Fraternities and Sororities. It was published in 2000, became a Los Angeles Times bestseller, a multiple Essence magazine bestseller (the bestsellers list for black books) and a few lists I can't remember. In other words, it's done really well. As a result, I travel the country, lecturing at colleges and universities about black fraternities and sororities.

My second book, The Ways of Black Folks: A Year in the Life of a People was published in 2003. It was named a National Association of Black Journalists must read for Fall 2004. I spent eighteen months traveling through the US, Europe, Africa, South America, and Canada, profiling members of Congress, porn stars, and murder victims. Interesting to say the least.

Right now, I'm finishing my third book and my first fiction novel. It's called Friends With Benefits, and it is scheduled to be published in September 2005. I'll talk about that in later posts.

And today, I had an interview with U.C.L.A. film school about being admitted to the MFA program. I want to learn how to write screenplays because I have a lot of stories to tell on film. And not one of them replicates "Soul Plane".

That's about it. I invite you to come on my journey. I don't know where we're going, but it should be fun. I'm going to post everyday. So don't miss a thing.