What Makes Dante Tick?

You may have the idea that what makes Dante Tick is all about the music A Dante Production provides, that is not so. The CEO of Dante is very driven to uplift the culture awareness of all things cultural. “What Makes Dante Tick?,” is going to expand the articles to move up a level. We all get very tired of the NEWS and how we are portrayed in the news as a people. The founder of BLACK MEN IN AMERICA. COM has allowed me to expand my segments and center them around the area in which we live. Various new things are coming up such as:

The Thought Brothers Podcast which also started this month on the newest show heading to the TOP: https://youtu.be/WkvomFmo3gQ

Calculations Talk Show

This show “Calculations,” provides some real-life thoughts from a cast of real people. Please sign up to receive it with frequency.

The new “What Makes Dante Tick?” is also providing new articles about real life in North Central Florida. The CEO of A Dante Production is very interested in things that are cultural and uplifting. What does that mean?

Cultural means relating to a particular society and its ideas, customs, music, and art. Below is and fantastic example of what is happening in North Central Florida. Too many people are comfortable with being uncomfortable.

F.R.E.S.H. Book Festival 2023

Donna M. Gray-Banks, Founder/Director

Growing up in Pittsburgh, PA., in a row house in a melanated neighborhood never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined what is now titled “The F.R.E.S.H. Book International Book Festival.” My grandmother was from Charleston South Carolina, and part of the Gullah Geechee nation, and being proud of who you are and whose you are in God’s eyes. She loved to be read to and of course I was always there to read the Bible, or the jet magazine (that had been shared by two or three families) and the local Black Newspaper the Pittsburgh Courier. Reading was essential to me as I always knew that I would not stay in the neighborhood that gave me so much comfort in many ways and strangled my creativity in other ways.

Living in a row house, multiple families shared the dwelling and only one official bathroom, the other was in the basement where other creatures dwelled, but in a pinch, you would take a stick and run down the steps and relieve yourself. I was found almost nightly in the closet where there was a pull-down light and steps to the attic. That was the only place for peace in a house filled with adults and children. My mother would come and find me with pencil in hand, note pad, and pillow asleep in the closet.

Fast forward, leaving the comfort of the melanated neighborhood and life in a city where I could get around on the bus with my eyes closed, I ventured to Washington, DC, which was nicknamed “Chocolate City” at that time to work for the federal government. Still unsure of where my passion for writing would take me, I was the secretary for every women’s organization I joined. Wrote love letters for male and female friends for their mates for Valentines Day and Birthdays. Then I joined the Black Expressions Book Club and fell in love with Sister Souljah’s The Coldest Winter Ever and Liar’s Game by Eric Jerome Dickey. I was enthralled with the idea that I could get a book written by someone who looked like me monthly. It was orgasmic. I had been keeping a journal most of my life so there were note pads and hundreds of composition books in my apartment at the time. I knew that one day I would write about the historical moments that shook the world to the core and being in DC just amplified all of those situations. But then life happens, marriage, children, life and death, mortgages, memories and missed opportunities. But in 2008, I would not be denied the opportunity to write a book. I went back in time and took a closet in my home and made it an office and from the closet “Ila’s Diamonds” the trilogy and F.R.E.S.H. were birthed. Once I became a published author, I quickly found out that there were no marketing tools to assist us and Amazon was not as popular as it is today. Traveling to book festivals near and far I found that what I did not receive was a mentor, someone to show me the ropes of the industry, or at least warn me of the landmines. F.R.E.S.H. was given to me divinely, the name, the logo, the mission, and the slogan “Literacy is a Legacy.” At F.R.E.S.H. we are laser focused on assisting young authors and seasoned authors with assistance to help promote their book(s). New technology is introduced, and old methodologies are incorporated with new. The pandemic opened the world for F.R.E.S.H. via the internet to meet, promote and market melanated authors from across the country and that connection has been eye opening and the knowledge received about the Windrush generation of melanated people who were wrongly detained, denied legal rights, threatened with deportation, etc. The story was so like our experience in the United States it brought tears to the eyes of us on the Internet workshop.

F.R.E.S.H. is about bringing kindred spirits together in all forms of literacy, film, poetry, writing, music, nonverbal and audio. Come join us and have an amazing experience. This year we have incorporated children’s theater, young and upcoming authors, poets, amazing veterans, and our partners from across the country will be joining us once again as well.

F.R.E.S.H. Book Festival Schedule 2023

Tickets to all events: www.freshbookfestivals.net

Thursday, February 23, 2023 –F.R.E.S.H Film Festival

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University

Captain Willie Miller Instructional Center (IC)
1 Aerospace Boulevard
Daytona Beach, FL

Reception: 6:30 p.m.

Film Presentation 7:15 p.m.