Let's talk about the book. I don't remember what I have and haven't said about it in the past, my brain is too full of grad school. I know I mentioned recently that it's no longer a duology, it's just going to be as long as it ends up being.
I originally had planned for two scenes that involved sexual violence, they have been removed because they didn't add anything to the plot and honestly, you need a really good reason to include that kind of violence beyond it just being something horrible to happen to your character.
I have a post on here called something like "Writing POC and LGBTQ+ Characters When You Aren't Either of Those Things", well that post is now invalid. Obviously, I'm still white, can't change that. But I am Queer, and that's all I'll say about that. That being said, the book has gotten a lot more gay than it originally was, I feel like there's a fair amount of subtext and some pretty blatant queerness as well, so for people who care about authorial intent I'll say it here: SHE'S QUEER!
Of course, not everyone will like that but it's not for them.
As for writing POC characters, I'm just writing them like people, imagine that. While trying to be mindful of historical context. I'm interested in getting a person of colour to beta-read it when it's done to tell me if I'm full of shit or not though.