Melanie S. Hatter is an award-winning author of two novels and one short story collection. Selected by Edwidge Danticat, Malawi’s Sisters won the inaugural Kimbilio National Fiction Prize, published by Four Way Books in 2019. The Color of My Soul won the 2011 Washington Writers’ Publishing House Fiction Prize, and Let No One Weep for Me, Stories of Love and Loss was released in 2014. She was a runner-up winner in the Fiction category of the 2015 and 2016 Montgomery Writes contests sponsored by the Maryland Writers’ Association. Melanie also is a participating author with the PEN/Faulkner Writers in Schools program, and serves on the board of the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation. Melanie received a bachelor’s degree in mass media arts from Hampton University and a master’s in writing from Johns Hopkins University. She has a background in journalism and corporate communications.