James Earl Hardy

JAMES EARL HARDY is the author of the best-selling B-Boy Blues series: B-Boy Blues (1994), praised as the first gay hip hop love story and prominently featured in Spike Lee’s Get On The Bus; it’s sequel, 2nd Time Around (1996); If Only For One Nite (1997); The Day Eazy-E Died (2001); Love The One You’re With (2002); and A House Is Not a Home (2005). The sextet chronicles the relationship between a Buppie from Brooklyn and a homeboy-bike messenger from Harlem. The seventh installment in the series, "Is It Still Jood To Ya?", is featured in the best-selling anthology, Visible Lives: Three Stories in Tribute to E. Lynn Harris (2010). B-Boy Blues was a Lammy finalist in 1995 (Best Small Press Title) and has become required reading in many African American/multicultural literature and gay/queer studies college courses. Mr. Hardy contributed the new introductory essay to the reissue of the groundbreaking Black Gay anthology, In The Life (2008), and his short story, "The Last Picture. Show.," will be included in the upcoming Best Gay Erotica 2011. He also recently added playwright to his literary resume: his first theatrical production, Confessions of a Homo Thug Porn Star--a one-man show about adult film star Tiger Tyson--recently won the Downtown Urban Theater Festival's Best Short Prize. In addition, Mr. Hardy is an award-winning entertainment feature writer and cultural critic. A 1993 honors graduate of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, his byline has appeared in The Advocate, Entertainment Weekly, Essence, New York Newsday, Newsweek, OUT, The Source, Upscale, Vibe, The Village Voice, and The Washington Post. His work has earned him two Educational Press Association Awards; grants from the E.Y. Harburg Foundation and the American Association of Sunday & Feature Editors; and scholarships from the Paul Rapoport Memorial Fund, and the New York and National chapters of the Association of Black Journalists. His essay, “Sylvester: Living Proof,” was a GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) Media Award finalist. He has also penned biographies on filmmaker Spike Lee and the pop music group Boyz II Men, both a part of Chelsea House Publishers’ Black Achievement Series.