About me
Sandra Jackson-Opoku is the author of three award-winning novels. The River Where Blood is Born won the American Library Association Black Caucus Award. Hot Johnny and the Women Who Loved Him was an Essence Magazine Bestseller in Hardcover Fiction. Savvy Summers and the Sweet Potato Crimes won the Malice Minotaur Award for First Mystery Novel and was finalist for the Agatha and Mary Higgins Clark Awards. Her second in the series, Savvy Summers and the Po’boy Perils released in July 2026. She also coedited the anthology Revise the Psalm: Work Celebrating the Writing of Gwendolyn Brooks. Jackson-Opoku’s fiction, nonfiction, and dramatic works are widely published and produced. Professional recognition includes a Plentitudes Journal Fiction Prize, a James Baldwin Fellowship at MacDowell Arts, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, a Globe Soup Story Award, a Chicago Esteemed Artist Award, an Iceland Writers Retreat Alumni Award, a Pushcart Prize nomination, and more.
