Phyllis Alesia Perry (born 1961, in

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

) is an

African-American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa. ...

journalist and author, who lives in the

Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, Dixieland, or simply the South) is List of regions of the United States, census regions defined by the United States Cens ...

. Phyllis Alesia Perry is the daughter of Harmon Griggs Perry, the first African-American reporter to be hired by the ''

Atlanta Journal ''The Atlanta Journal-Constitution'' (''AJC'') is an American daily newspaper based in metropolitan area of Atlanta, Georgia. It is the flagship publication of Cox Enterprises. The ''Atlanta Journal-Constitution'' is the result of the merger ...

''. She grew up in

Tuskegee, Alabama Tuskegee ( ) is a city in Macon County, Alabama, Macon County, Alabama, United States. General Thomas Simpson Woodward, a Creek War veteran under Andrew Jackson, laid out the city and founded it in 1833. It became the county seat in the same y ...

, and graduated with a degree in communications from the

University of Alabama The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, the Capstone, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of ...

in 1982. Becoming a journalist, she was among a group of ''

Alabama Journal ''Alabama Journal'', formerly the ''Evening Journal'', ''Montgomery Journal'', and ''Alabama Journal and the Times'', was a newspaper in Montgomery, Alabama founded in 1889. It ceased publication in 1993. History There was an ''Alabama Journal'' ...

'' reporters who won the

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...

for investigating Alabama's high

infant mortality Infant mortality is the death of an infant before the infant's first birthday. The occurrence of infant mortality in a population can be described by the infant mortality rate (IMR), which is the number of deaths of infants under one year of age ...

rate. Perry's

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to pu ...

, ''Stigmata'' (1998), follows the journey of a young woman, Lizzie, pursuing the story behind a handmade quilt she has inherited on the death of her grandmother. ''A Sunday in June'' (2004) is a

prequel A prequel is a literary, dramatic or cinematic work whose story precedes that of a previous work, by focusing on events that occur before the original narrative. A prequel is a work that forms part of a backstory to the preceding work. The term ...

to ''Stigmata''.

Works

*''Stigmata'', Hyperion, 1998 *''A Sunday in June'', Hyperion, 2004

References

1961 births Living people 20th-century African-American women writers 20th-century African-American writers 20th-century American journalists 20th-century American novelists 20th-century American women journalists 20th-century American women writers 21st-century African-American women writers 21st-century African-American writers 21st-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American novelists 21st-century American women writers African-American novelists American women novelists Journalists from Alabama Novelists from Alabama People from Tuskegee, Alabama {{US-journalist-1960s-stub