Venus earned her MFA in poetry from Mills College and her BA in business communications from The University of Akron. She’s a board member for Poetry Center San Jose, volunteers for Santa Clara Read and promotes literacy. This accomplished actress opened for Def Poetry on Broadway, and was awarded “Most Inspiring Solo Performance” in 2012, by the Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival. Her short play “Race & War: an awkward conversation” won the Ardella Mills Prize for creative non-fiction and was a featured play at the 2015 Tampa Bay Theatre Festival. Her poems have been published in Poet Lore, UK’s X Magazine, SpokenVizions and anthologies including, "How I Freed My Soul", "A Time to Rhyme" and "A Generation Defining Itself." She’s an Austin International poetry slam finalist and former MTV correspondent.

Her latest book “Lyrics for Langston” was endorsed by the Langston Hughes Family museum and she’s the author of “She Rose: on a journey from girl to Goddess”. She's interested in authenticity, diversity and truth. She’s known for her tributes of past and present day heroes and sheroes and facilitates improv and writing workshops. She searches for solutions, and promotes not only peace but empowerment. Her work can be found on Amazon, iTunes and at www.venusjones.com. One of her favorite quotes is by Alice Walker – “The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.”