Week Four of OUR Favorites, Day Five:Favorite Authors- Octavia Butler + Ellen Oh's Prophecy/Warrior & Sarwat Chadda's The Savage Fortress/The City of Death giveaway!

So we've officially reached the last day of our event. It's so sad to see we are on the very last day of showing the book blogosphere community all of our favorite works of art that highlight diversity.

We've showed some awesome book covers, highlighted some great digital artists who always manage to draw and paint diversely. We've even showcased some of our favorite book bloggers!

Our last week we highlighted authors. Some of our favorites included newbie to our list Sarwat Chadda, long time favorites such as Emlyn Chand, Barry Lyga, and most of all Ellen Oh.

But there's just one more author who's made a great impact in our lives, and I dont think authors of color, particularly ones who write in the SF/F, Horror or Speculative Fiction genres, would be anywhere with her.

Our last and final favorite:

Octavia Butler

Known as "The Great Dame of Science Fiction", there was something about the late Ms.Butler's writing that provoked many emotions from her readers. Whether I've loved and had mixed feelings about her work, I've always found her the most thought provoking writer of this generation.

While many authors shy away from harsh subjects, such as race, class, sexual abuse/trauma, sexuality, gender and species, Octavia has a way of addressing these subjects in each and every one of her books.

I've met lovers, and readers who didnt quite understand the messages behind her tough subjects, but one thing was always certain. Her work stayed with them.

To this day, I've never read a book, I was both disgusted and enthralled with as much as the first book in her "Xenogenesis" series "Dawn."

She even inspired the petition by author Daniel Jose Older to change the former face of the "World Fantasy Award" from H.P. Lovecraft, to the awesome Octavia. You can find that petition here. We hope everyone considers taking the time to sign. Lovecraft was a good writer of that time, but he was also everything that's wrong with the literary, and entertainment world right now.

Octavia has been the inspiration to so many writers, marginalized or not, and I dont think you could want to write SF/F without first having read one of her books.

We'll make it easy on you! Here's a link to her amazon page!

So there you have it! While the month is not officially over, there are still 3 days left to enter our giveaway!

Don't forget to comment for a chance to win Ellen Oh's "Prophecy/Warrior" and Sarwat Chadda's "The Savage Fortress/The City of Death!"All you have to do is comment and you're automatically entered!It's that easy!