midnight & indigo is a literary media company and the creative home for Black women writers worldwide. Since 2018, we have published more than 400 writers, taught more than 1,000 students, and built one of the few platforms in the literary world dedicated entirely to the stories, craft, and careers of Black women across the diaspora.
We do three things: we publish original fiction and essays in our print and digital journal, we run an online Writing Program offering classes and coaching, and we offer professional developmental editing for writers ready to deepen their work. All of it is rooted in the same commitment: to take Black women’s writing seriously and without apology. We are 100% Black woman-owned.
I hit the jackpot on the morning of my tenth Christmas, I remember it like it was yesterday. Tiptoeing across the abbreviated L from my bedroom to the entrance of the living room, I spied it. A box. Huge. Sparkly. Adorned with a matte red bow twisted to the side just so, as if to mask its own excitement at the grand unwrap. My ten-year-old self giggly because I knew, even before I opened it, that Mom had bought me what I’d always wanted.
A Brother.
Typewriter that is.
Oh, not just any typewriter…this was the one with the built-in white-out strip and the screen that allowed you to view what you intended to write before it typed it out. Yes, jackpot! I wrote four stories that night, and spent a countless number of hours sharing my prize with my childhood best friend Joy over the next year or so; birthing our own characters, rewriting the tales of Edgar Allan Poe, and crafting rap lyrics (Gucci and Mercedes…we were so serious) over snacks. Our words were going to change the world.
My love of writing was only matched by my love of reading. Racing home from school, on most days, to find out what new adventures Pippi, Ramona, and Anne were going to get into, before I discovered what seemed like an entire world of other, previously hidden stories by women who were once girls who looked just like me. Characters who spoke to many of the life stages I walked in, often speaking to experiences or awakening an innate familiarity that I was not always mature enough to fully comprehend. Stories by Black women writers become a refuge.
Something magical happens in the pages of a book, when you see yourself reflected in the characters you love. Or the first time you see your own words staring back at you from a previously blank page.
I’ve spent the past few decades chasing other dreams. More “tangible” dreams of success in business, media. Ignoring the one that was placed in my heart all of those years before. But the last time my younger self tapped me on the shoulder and inquired, If not now, then when, I was ready to answer.
midnight & indigo is the fulfillment of a young girl’s dream, manifest in the woman she grew up to become. Launched in 2018, midnight & indigo is a literary platform, both print and digital, dedicated to publishing short stories and narrative essays by Black women writers. In January 2022, we launched our Writing Program for Black women writers. One I hope will make a meaningful contribution to the literary movements that have thrived for generations; through the pain shared in Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl, and the self-love lessons of I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings. From the often underestimated love told in Their Eyes Were Watching God, to the resilience displayed in Half of a Yellow Sun. And now, through a new generation of writers who will share their own stories, and readers who will find connection in their prose. I hope to work with you to make midnight & indigo a magical place.
midnight & indigo has grown into something larger than one journal. Today it is a literary media platform: publishing stories by 400+ Black women writers, teaching craft to 1000+ students, and editing manuscripts. All of it built around the same belief that started with a typewriter and my ten-year-old imagination:
That Black women’s stories deserve the best possible home.
Mother. Daughter. Friend. Rock. Superwoman. I’m proud of who I am becoming. midnight & indigo is my attempt to step out on faith and do what He wants me to do. I pray that it can bring you closer to living in your purpose too. Let’s do this!
Sincerely,
Ianna A. Small,
Founder & Chief Literary Architect
midnight & indigo
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Founder & Editor In Chief
Ianna A. Small is the founder and editor-in-chief of midnight & indigo, a literary media company and creative home for Black women writers. Since 2018, she has published more than 400 writers, educated more than 1,000 through the m&i Writing Program, and built one of the few platforms dedicated entirely to Black women’s literary voices across the diaspora. A developmental editor with more than a decade of experience, she is a member of ACES: The Society for Editing and the Editorial Freelancers Association, and a proud Syracuse University alumna.
By night, you might catch her lost in a Black or South Asian novel or yelling at a twist in a Korean horror movie. She binges Insecure, The Golden Girls, and cultural food documentaries like it’s a competitive sport, and dreams of one day running m&i from a lounge chair overlooking the archipelagos of her happy place: Greece. Roti in one hand, a manuscript in another.
Email her at editor@midnightandindigo.com
