Romance Slam Jam History
"The Romance Slam Jam grew out of an early desire to recognize, and pay respect to OUR authors, and to celebrate their craft with their avid fans."
Emma Rodgers, Ashira Tosihwe and Francis Ray gave
birth to the ROMANCE SLAM JAM in 1995 in Dallas, Texas, to demonstrate what
Nikki Giovanni describes as “The Power, Passion and Pain of Black Love.”
There was much success at Black Images marketing, promoting and selling the
works of black romance writers since the early 90’s that they decided it was
time to take their love for romance to a new level by bringing writers and
readers together. After two successful in-store events in 1995 and 1996, two
terrific cruises and program in Nassau, Bahamas in 1997 and 1998 they took a
year off (1999).
RSJ 2000 - The ROMANCE SLAM JAM went to the next level. This was the first Slam to
be organized by a book club. ROMANCE NOIR BOOK CLUB, with the guidance of Emma
Rodgers, Francis Ray, and Anna Laurence, the event was a huge success. When Miss
Emma
asked Cindi Louis, founder of Romance Noir Book Club what she hoped people would
take from the event, she simply said, “All the love that is in this room right
now. And for the 2001 committee to do something with the awards that our guest
speaker, Beverly Jenkins talked about at the luncheon on Saturday.”
RSJ 2001 -
With the leadership of reader, Brenda Woodbury; writer, Brenda Jackson;
bookseller, Jackie Perkins of Montsho Books; and SISTAHS of DISTINCTION BOOK
CLUB the vision was brought to fruition in Orlando, Florida 2001. The EMMA Award
was born. It only was fit for the first EMMA award to be presented by Emma
Rodgers, herself. That award went to Deirdre Savoy for Favorite New Author.
Making Romance Slam Jam 2001 the biggest as of yet.
RSJ 2002 -
The torch was then passed on to writer, Jacquelin Thomas and JOURNEY’S END
LITERARY CLUB and held March 7-10, 2002 in Durham, NC. This was an elegant
affair.
RSJ 2007 - Hosted by the Inner Elevation from the Written Word (IEWW) Book Club of Miami, FL, March 15th-18th, 2007. Adrienne McSweeney, Tisha Hill and other members of the Inner Elevation from the Written Word Book Club invested their money, time and talent into making this RSJ a first class, no holes barred event. Marcia King-Gamble host author. Harper Collins supported the conference with books for door prizes.
RSJ 2008 - Hosted by Chi-Town Raw and authors Ann Clay, Barbara Keaton, Deatri King-Bey, Dyanne Davis, and Lisa G. Riley in Chicago IL, the theme was Come On Home, and take the Slam Jam home in spirit is what this event did with Keynote Speaker, Alice Wootson. This is also the year the Romance Slam Jam Organization came into being.
RSJ 2009 - The economy took a turn
for the worse, and unfortunately, the conference had to be cancelled.