In this children’s book as memoir, self-defined biracial activist, dancer, writer, high school student Surayyah “RayRay” Fofana has written a charming story that explores universal themes of identity and touchstones of belonging. The vibrancy of individuals, classmates, families, and communities rendered in full-color illustrations project depth and dimension while the figures present people of various shades, ages, and physical abilities. RayRay’s journey toward recognizing herself is timely and timeless.
How to Wrestle a Girl, Stories by Venita Blackburn
Fiction, short stories
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, September 2021
In two parts and acknowledgments How to Wrestle a Girl contemplates the circuitous paths toward freedom to live as one’s unapologetic, authentic self. In the titular “How to Wrestle a Girl” (fourth entry in Part I) narrow ideas about gendered expectations invite competitors to consider the repercussions of misogyny, toxic masculinity, and identity crises. Escaping the tenacious hold of stereotypes, puberty, assumptions based on those factors and more seems relentless. And yet there’s a fundamental buoyancy to the entire collection. So many terms of endearment: lil sister, baby cousin, Mom Mom, last names used affectionately, familial relation as moniker, initials, nicknames–all used significantly more often than insults and slurs. Most of the multifaceted entries are rendered in conventional prose formats, supporting a reader’s focus on various thought threads. Those structures contrast and highlight the many facets of the free-form poem “Side Effects Include Dizziness, Ringing in the Ears, and Memory Loss” and the puzzle structuring of “In the Counselor’s Waiting Room with No Wi-Fi” and “Answer Sheet” in addition to a “Quiz” as biting social commentary about familiar categories of educators from enthusiastic newbies to disillusioned grumps. This collection entertains and provokes as it challenges readers to free ourselves and each other from the limiting, destructive, hateful attitudes and beliefs we hold about ourselves and others.
Gaia and Luna: In the View of the Moon by Mark Newton, author & publisher
Fantasy, November 2021
From the Big Bang to speculations about how and if the human species will survive, Gaia and Luna anthropomorphizes the elements of the universe. Earth and the moon along with the other planets and stars debate their relationships with each other and with humans, at one point described as “terror-formers” who seem determined architects of their own demise–a legitimate observation. Are we doomed? Predetermination versus free will, empathy, and a famous John F. Kennedy quote more broadly applied to Earth Conservation contribute to an overall optimistic tone in this fable for which children–and adults looking for fun ways to engage them in discussion about humans and the universe–seem to be the target audience. Its approach is similar to that of Edith Hamilton’s Mythology as applied to the universe mixed with Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Carl Sagan, and Sesame Street.
More Voices That Enchant, Haunt, Echo
Bad Fat Black Girl, Notes from a Trap Feminist by Sesali Bowen
Non-fiction memoir
Amistad, October 2021
With all names except those of the author and her trusty vehicle, changed to avoid legal unpleasantness, this relentlessly entertaining and illuminating memoir brings Black women’s multifaceted lives and identities from the margins to center page. The author names and challenges the limitations of respectability politics in the fight for equal access to resources and opportunities and limitless possibilities for thriving.
From the epilogue:
We deserve to be heard, have our humanity taken seriously, and trusted to lead our own rebellions and revolutions.
Unbound, My Story of Liberation and the Birth of the Me Too Movement by Tarana Burke
Non-fiction memoir
Flatiron Books, September 2021
There are no words that serve justice to this author’s human magnificence more than her own beginning in the prologue: The story of how empathy for others–without which the work of ‘me too’ doesn’t exist–starts with empathy for that dark place of shame where we keep our stories, and where I kept mine.
Read this delicately nuanced, intimate and triumphant memoir with a box of tissues within reach.
Black Fatigue, How Racism Erodes the Mind, Body and Spirit by Mary-Frances Winters
Non-fiction
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., September 2020
A safe literary space and validation for people who are targeted by racism, and a concise tutorial for anti-racist allies of Black and Brown people (who are exhausted in general and probably tired of answering questions posed by well-intentioned Anglo/Caucasian/white people who sincerely want to understand). The preface, introduction, nine chapters, notes, acknowledgments, index, about the author and about The Winters Group, Inc. all honor, illuminate, hold accountable, and call to action the imperatives for eradicating racism. It’s an intellectual companion read to The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander and Sister Citizen by Melissa Harris-Perry.
Promise That You Will Sing About Me, The Power and Poetry of Kendrick Lamar by Miles Marshall Lewis
Poetry and commentary
St. Martin’s Press, September 2021
Impressive wordsmiths Alicia Garza, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Ivie Ani, Kevin L. C:ark and more contemplate Kendrick Lamar (Duckworth)’s category-defying genius, and that’s not hyperbole. If budget and storage space and environmental beliefs allow, buy a copy in order to indulge in the need to highlight, underline, and jot notes in the margins while listening to his mesmerizing, provocative lyrics and riffs.
Requiem of Silence (Earthsinger Chronicles #4) by L. Penelope
Speculative
St. Martin’s Griffin, August 2021
Who can Queen Jasminda trust?
Will a shared threat of annihilation force the people of Elsira and Lagrimar to work together toward a common goal of survival?
The final entry in this engaging series answers those questions and more. Personal quandaries, epic battles, and devastating consequences take readers on a volatile concluding adventure that satisfies. Consuming each installment in chronological order provides maximum coherence and momentum.
The Sweetest Remedy by Jane Igharo
Fiction
Jove, September 2021
What are you?
The dreaded, annoying, rude, nonsensical question.
The answer is simple and complicated.
Hannah Bailey travels thousands of physical and philosophical miles to unearth her own answers.
You Made Me Love You, Selected Stories, 1981–2018 by John Edgar Wideman
Short stories collection
Scribner, April 2021
The introduction by Walton Muyumba launches readers into a literary journey of dismantling the confinement of African and African-American Blackness to broaden and reconfigure it in nuanced, self-defined authenticity with John Edgar Wideman as a talented, generous guide possessing encyclopedic breadth and depth of piercing literary range.
No Words (Little Bridge Island #3) by Meg Cabot
Romantic women’s fiction
WIlliam Morrow, October 2021
Personal mayhem a la “I Love Lucy” and “Saturday Night Live” delivers sharp, humorous social commentary about the power hierarchy in publishing as dictated by gender, age, genre, category and more. My reading about Jo Wright’s story started Friday, November 12, 2021 when no words could express the depth of my spiritual fatigue connected to the U.S. in/justice system, and an immediate joyous book escape was essential. No Words provided that along with assorted laugh-aloud scenes and sad, but true observations about the book industry. It’s a bookish nerd’s gem with spoof-tastic vibes.
Comments
Post a Comment