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Jan 11, 20243 min read
Sula by Toni Morrison
Isn’t it wonderful to have these authors you just feel entirely safe with? I can open any Toni Morrison book and I know for sure that I...
Jun 29, 20233 min read
The Colour Purple by Alice Walker
Alice Walker’s modern classic The Color Purple portrays the lives and struggles of African American women in the last century, marked by...
Nov 6, 20222 min read
The Booker Prize 2022 #12: Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley
Kiara is seventeen and desperately trying to pay the rent that has been increased yet again. After her father’s death and with her mother...
Oct 6, 20221 min read
The Booker Prize 2022 #6: The Trees by Percival Everett
Money, Mississippi does not hold what its name promises but is home to an interesting set of characters who wake up to a series of brutal...
Oct 12, 20212 min read
The Good Immigrant by Nikesh Shukla
What does it mean to have to change your name for your classmates to be able to pronounce and remember it? How does it feel to be...
Aug 10, 20212 min read
Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall
The term intersectional feminism was coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw to highlight how different dimensions of oppression – for example sexism...
May 18, 20212 min read
The Sellout by Paul Beatty
The Sellout is a work of biting satire, and you best be ready for it when you open this book. Our protagonist is a young man who grew up...
May 11, 20212 min read
Conjure Women by Afia Atakora
“The black baby’s crying wormed and bloomed.” When a pale and black-eyed baby is born in its black caul, Rue hesitates before freeing it...
Mar 16, 20212 min read
Fiction and Non-Fiction by Chinua Achebe
Last week I read both an essay collection and a novel by the celebrated Nigerian author Chinua Achebe. Africa’s Tarnished Name is a...
Mar 9, 20213 min read
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Poetic and heart-breaking. Those are the first words that come to mind when I think about Toni Morrison’s masterpiece Beloved. I only...
Dec 22, 20203 min read
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Ta-Nehisi Coates’ 2015 essay Between the World and Me is a great contemporary read to follow James Baldwin's essays. Coates picks up...
Dec 18, 20203 min read
James Baldwin - Essays
I had a wonderful week: I spent it with James Baldwin's essays in The Fire Next Time and Notes of a Native Son. I first fell in love with...
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