R.L. Byrd

R.L. Byrd was born in the coastal town of Brunswick, Georgia, in a time where America and the South was growing and evolving. Raised by his grandparents during his early childhood, it was during this time, in the 1970’s, that R.L. developed his “old soul” listening to the many hardship, faith-based and enduring stories of Life, Love and the never-ending search for Acceptance in the world. It would be this early upbringing that would shape his world not only as a person, but as a writer.

His passion for writing was delayed by a similar passion for Architecture and the built environment; and he pursued this passion by obtaining a Bachelor of Architecture degree from the University of Oklahoma in 1992 and started his architectural career in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he worked on construction documents for Walmart stores built in Texas, Louisiana and Ohio.

After many years of carrying stories, characters and images in his mind, R.L. found them revisiting him on a more frequent basis as the years rolled by; and beginning in 2007, it wasn’t a day that went by that the pull to write didn’t lure him back to the pen and paper. Finally in 2008, while in Vietnam, he had an epiphany which proved strong enough to veer him from his conventional way of thinking to explore the unconventional—including the insights of a widely popular Atlanta celebrity with clairvoyant capabilities. It was here that what was revisiting and tugging at him everyday was confirmed; she said, “Boy, you’re a writer and you need to write.” When R.L. entered the reading, he entered as a typical, everyday, 9-to-5 worker; when he left, he left as a struggling neo-writer. At this point, the stage was set. This is where his new journey began.

Looking for Sweet Love (published by Llumina Press, 2010) is the first novel from a sleuth of unfinished manuscripts started in his early years. The characters, although up-to-date and contemporary, reflect some of the same time-enduring struggles told by those elders of yesteryear. His second novel, Black Coffee (published by Llumina Press, 2012) is the sequel to Looking for Sweet Love (told from the male characters’ perspective) and picks-up where the first novel left off. Currently working on his third novel, The Art of Scandal (a work based on true-life events), R.L. uses a private college as a backdrop, to explore workplace relationships among black men and women.

R.L., lives in Atlanta, Georgia, and now works on both of his passions—Architecture, and writing enlightening stories of the trials and tribulations, faced, during one’s journey through life.