Not All Dogs
by C. Kelly Robinson

“Not All Dogs is dedicated to hundreds of positive men who have touched my life, starting with my father, grandfathers, uncles, and continuing through to my professional and spiritual mentors. Even though the market for Black male authors is booming, I believe there is still a need for more stories that trumpet the number of hard-working, responsible, committed men out here. We all enjoy laughing at the ‘game-playing’ antics in our contemporary literature, but I hope Not All Dogs will remind the brothers and the sisters that there are a lot of us out here trying to grow into the responsible husbands and fathers our community needs. I believe the journeys that Brandon, Terence, Larry, and O.J. make in this book contain pieces of everyone’s story. I hope you are uplifted and entertained by Not All DogsAll Dogs.” Author, C. Kelly Robinson

AUTHOR SPEAKS UP FOR POSITIVE BLACK MEN
DAYTON, OHIO – Daily, Black Americans awake to negative reports on the state of the males in their community: more trapped in America’s prisons than enrolled in college, increasing numbers of "deadbeat Daddies," and the embarrassing exploits of numerous entertainers and athletes. Not All Dogs, a new novel available this month from Dayton-based Against the Grain Communications, is a story of suspense, romance, and humor that combats these negative perceptions.

Author Chet "C. Kelly" Robinson has written a novel inspired by Terry McMillan’s legendary Waiting To Exhale. "With Exhale,

Terry McMillan gave a voice to the concerns of African-American women, in a style that was entertaining yet genuine enough to engage Black readers and still educate non-Black fans," said Robinson. The author believes the time has arrived for a story that accomplishes similar feats for young Black men.

"Exhale’s success opened the door to a number of female and male contemporary novelists, but in my experience, I have yet to see a book that showcased men in my age range – eighteen to mid-thirties – in a way that we could say ‘Yeah, that tells some of my story.’ I feel like we’ve had to sit back and hope that the handful of young authors out there – most of whom are female – choose to tell our stories for us. I felt there was a need for more stories about men by men."

Not All Dogs is the story of four college seniors’ attempt to save a struggling children’s community center in Washington, D.C. The story’s focus shifts between the plight of the Ellis Community Center and the intertwined personal lives of the four housemates, each of whom fights his own way on the path to manhood. The four men – who include a shy premedical student longing for love, a shallow "smooth operator" coming to grips with intra-racial prejudice, a financially strapped engineering major dodging the call of the streets, and a hypocritical student minister – lay aside their differences in pursuit of a common goal. Based near the campus of fictional Highland University (loosely based on Robinson’s alma mater, Howard University), Not All Dogs portrays the unique pleasures and challenges of Black college life and uses the men’s journeys to manhood to address social issues on the minds of today’s readers. Not All Dogs is the story of four college seniors’ attempt to save a struggling children’s community center in Washington, D.C.

The story’s focus shifts between the plight of the Ellis Community Center and the intertwined personal lives of the four housemates, each of whom fights his own way on the path to manhood. The four men – who include a shy premedical student longing for love, a shallow "smooth operator" coming to grips with intra-racial prejudice, a financially strapped engineering major dodging the call of the streets, and a hypocritical student minister – lay aside their differences in pursuit of a common goal. Based near the campus of fictional Highland University (loosely based on Robinson’s alma mater, Howard University), Not All Dogs portrays the unique pleasures and challenges of Black college life and uses the men’s journeys to manhood to address social issues on the minds of today’s readers.

School and has ties to the Tabernacle Baptist and Omega Baptist churches of Dayton. As a teen, he persevered despite a speech impediment and went on to earn a B.B.A. in finance from Howard and an MBA from Washington University in St. Louis, before embarking on a career in corporate finance. His past volunteer activities include Mentor St. Louis, Big Brothers Big Sisters (Washington, D.C.), and Student Venture Ministries. He wrote Not All Dogs in his spare time, while studying creative writing at local colleges in St. Louis and receiving instruction from the Cincinnati-based Writer’s Digest School.