The author of the Dogon-Hunter series took an immediate interest in the Dogon of Mali the first time she heard about their connection to the stars.  Connecting that interest to a romance series didn't come until many years later. Like most young female readers, Jackie’s early adult reading material leaned toward romance, mostly contemporary. As she got older, she found she could enjoy just about any genre, but mysteries held her interest the most.
   

    A few years ago, a publisher sent her an Advance Readers Copy (ARC) of a paranormal romance and it seemed to combine her early love of romance with the need for a story that reaches beyond the attraction of one adult to another.
   

     Always the voracious reader, she read at least fifty novels, complete sets of several series before she started to wonder, “where are the paranormals by and about women of color?” Although she did find several Urban fantasies, the paranormals were few and far between. That is when she decided to write her own series. 

    Since she felt she wanted to connect the Hunters to a pantheon, she was finally afforded a chance to write about and restudy the Dogon. 

    Jacqueline Turner Banks is a graduate of Ferris State University and the University of Michigan. She takes her research so seriously, many years ago, while researching one of her novels, she became a certified Hypnotherapist.

    She has a series of juvenile novels published (four) and an adult mystery series (two). Her work has appeared in several anthologies.  

    Her juvenile novels have been nominated for awards as well.

THE NEW ONE was a Kansas Reading Circle selection,

Egg Drop Blues was a Florida Sunshine State Young Readers Award 1999-2000 nominee

and A DAY FOR VINCENT CHIN AND ME was an Oklahoma Sequoyah Book Award and a North Carolina nominee.

Comments like, “Intriguing topics turn up in Banks’  novels.. . .” LIBRARY TALK and “Banks touches on many modern themes without settling for easy answers.” THE HORN BOOK Magazine,  make her especially proud of her reviews.

    Her adult reviews have been equally positive. Publisher Weekly said  “(Main character, Ruby) possessed of a quirky good humor delightfully expressed.” A story she wrote appears in an anthology, SHADES OF BLACK: Crimes and Mysteries Stories by African-American Writers.

Dogon-Hunters@comcast.net