Sep 12, 2024
Review of Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward
Annis is a young Southern woman enslaved, sold, and abused in the years before the Civil War. In Let Us Descend , she leans on the...
Sep 3, 2024
Review of James by Percival Everett
Percival Everett's James is a fascinating retelling of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the point of view of enslaved Black character...
Mar 6, 2024
Review of The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride
The mystery bookends feel largely unimportant to the story, the cast of characters sometimes feels endless, and the story meanders, but...
Feb 14, 2024
Review of All the Sinners Bleed by S. A. Cosby
I didn't feel drawn into this novel of the horrifying serial killing of children of color in a small Virginia community and the...
Feb 1, 2024
Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid
ICYMI: This is an irresistible story and set of characters, but with fascinating depth. The issues Reid explores are enormous and are...
Jan 31, 2024
Review of Come and Get It by Kiley Reid
Come and Get It is the story of an RA and the consequences of her actions related to privacy and safety; the book dabbles in issues of...
Nov 21, 2023
Review of Yellowface by R. F. Kuang
This darkly funny story made me cringe while staying riveted by the main protagonist's deeply faulted reasoning, criminal actions, and...
Nov 8, 2023
Review of They Called Us Exceptional: And Other Lies that Raised Us by Prachi Gupta
In her memoir, Gupta explores the stressful, tragic disconnect between the "perfect minority" image her father demanded of the family and...
Sep 26, 2023
Review of Blue Hour by Tiffany Clarke Harrison
The slim novel Blue Hour explores ambivalence about motherhood, unflinching details of the experience of miscarriage, relationship...
Aug 24, 2023
Review of This House Is Not a Home by Katlia
Katlia's story is based on actual events, detailing the displacement of Indigenous people and the devastating consequences of greed, the...
Aug 10, 2023
Review of Those We Thought We Knew by David Joy
David Joy's mystery, Those We Thought We Knew, set in the North Carolina mountains, explores issues of racism, corruption, generational...
Aug 8, 2023
Review of A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America by Timothy Egan
In this narrative nonfiction, Egan explores the Klan's explosive growth and power in the 1920s in states like Indiana and beyond, while...
Jul 12, 2023
Review of Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
Adjei-Brenyah's novel explores in disturbing detail a version of a society that may feel familiar: a corrupt, greedy prison system; the...
Jun 8, 2023
Review of Legendborn (The Legendborn Cycle #1) by Tracy Deonn
The first in the series sets up a strong young Black heroine who bucks tradition as she explores her own heritage, flexes her newfound...
Feb 2, 2023
Review of Maame by Jessica George
Jessica George's debut Maame takes on big issues of race, culture, and the challenges of growing up between two cultures while shining in...
Dec 22, 2022
Review of Blackwater Falls by Ausma Zehanat Khan
I was intrigued by the issues raised in Blackwater Falls--police corruption, racial conflict, religious fervor and faith, secret...
Nov 2, 2022
Review of Horse by Geraldine Brooks
Geraldine Brooks's Horse digs into issues of race across three timelines, linked by a special bond between an enslaved man and a horse in...
Jul 20, 2022
Review of The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray
The Personal Librarian is historical fiction about the real-life figure of Belle da Costa Greene, J.P. Morgan's personal librarian who...
Jun 23, 2022
Review of All Her Little Secrets by Wanda M. Morris
All Her Little Secrets shines when Ellice Littlejohn wrests control of her increasingly dangerous circumstances and when racial issues...
May 18, 2022
Review of The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones
“In exposing our nation’s troubled roots, the 1619 Project challenges us to think about a country whose exceptionalism we treat as the...