“When I was a kid in school in Richardson ISD, I was really the only little girl who looked like me. The books that we read reflected that. I just didn’t want that for kids these days,” Pugh said.
Pugh, who has been an educator for two decades, recently released her new children’s books the Lil Tracey Series.
“I really needed my daughter to see this. I wanted to increase the visibility of the Black, female protagonist in children’s books,” Pugh said. “For me, it was about establishing a footprint of change through youth literacy development.”
Pugh has partnered with the #1000BlackGirlBooks campaign founded by Marley Dias, a teen author and activist, to donate books worldwide in order to increase the visibility of Black, female protagonists in children’s books.