a refuge of how: stories written by black women
After a tragedy in the black community I am often asked by white people, “What can I do?”
To be honest, I think deep down inside, dear white friends, you know what you can do. You know you can read a book, sign a petition, speak up and out when your white family member or white co-worker makes that racist joke, not vote for that racist politician, find a more inclusive church, enroll your kids in a more diverse school. Although I am a black woman, most of my life has been lived squarely in a white world. But when it became clear that I needed to do better, I knew what I needed to do. If we are all honest, our real question isn’t “What can I do?”, but ”What will it cost me? What will I have to give up? How much will it hurt?”
All I can say is that my blackness costs me everything—even your whiteness. Should we have to pay so much? After all, becoming a fully realized human being who, in turn, fully realizes the humanity of all other human beings, is an extravagant gift. It does not come for free. It costs a pretty penny. It costs cashing in every former way of existing. But don’t panic – it is well worth your investment. The equity is astronomical.
One thing you can do to honor Breonna Taylor’s life is to commit to reading more books written by black women. Know our stories intimately so that you can be our allies in white spaces where we are not present. Make us visible to those who have never taken a second look at us.
Here are all the books written by black women currently on my shelves, on my Kindle and in my audible.com library. My shelves didn’t always look this way. Friends, no lie, my shelves were as white as white could be. Great stories! Stories I love—but as white as the driven snow. I still love all stories. We should all love all stories, and our shelves should reflect that passion.
One caveat—it’s easy to have a shelf filled with books by black women. But don’t just buy diversity. That is the cheapest form of… I don’t even know what to call that—fakeness? Insincerity? Grossness? Let’s just say that it’s just ratchet. Find the stories of black women that you want to read and read them. Then put them on your shelf to remind you that there are people in the world with stories that look nothing like your own.
I listed these writers with links to the best way to showcase their story. So don’t be surprised that there’s not a link directly to their book. I encourage you to listen to their interviews, read their bios, watch their TED talks. Be authentically connected to them. Jump in the boat with them! There are no filters here. No forewarnings. A story cannot harm you. Reading a book is the lowest risk you can take, so try not to censor. Settle into a comfortable chair and allow yourself to squirm when it gets uncomfortable.
Lastly, reading a book is only a beginning. But, I promise you it’s enough.
NON-FICTION
Brenda Salter McNeil
Roadmap to Reconciliation
Christena Cleveland
Disunity in Christ
Jo Saxton
The Dream of You: Let Go of Broken Identities and Life the Life You
Ready to Rise
Dr. Joy DeGruy
Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome: America’s Legacy of Enduring Injury and Healing
Lisa Sharon Harper
The Very Good Gospel: How Everything Wrong Can Be Made Right
Chanequa Walker-Barnes
I Bring the Voices of My People: A Womanist Vision for Racial Reconciliation
Too Heavy a Yoke: Black Women and the Burden of Strength
Reni Eddo-Lodge
Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race
Michelle Alexander
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
Latasha Morrison
Be the Bridge: Pursuing God’s Heart for Racial Reconciliation
Daina Ramey Berry and Kali Nicole Gross
A Black Women’s History of the United States
Sabrina Strings
Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia
Cheryl Kirk-Duggan and Marilyn E. Thornton
Mary Had a Baby: An. Advent Bible Study Based on African American Spirituals
Dr. Carol Anderson
White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide
Isabel Wilkerson
The Warmth of Other Suns
Marita Golden
Don’t Play in the Sun
Pamela Newkirk
Letters from Black America
Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers
They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South
Cecelie Berry
Rise Up Singing: Black Women Writers on Motherhood
Christina Sharpe
In the Wake: On Blackness and Being
Ruth King
Mindful of Race: Transforming Racism from the Inside Out
Nell Irvin Painter
The History of White People
Sojourner Truth
Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Bondswoman of Olden Time with a History of Her Labor and Correspondence by Sojourner Truth; Edited by Nell Irvin Painter
Deidra Riggs
One: United in a Divided World
Ijeoma Oluo
So You Want to Talk About Race
Latham Thomas
Own Your Glow: A Soulful Guide to Luminous Living and Crowning
Dr. Barbara A. Holmes
Joy Unspeakable: Contemplative Practices of the Black Church
Race and the Cosmos (get the latest edition from the Center for Action and Contemplation)
Tamara Winfrey Harris
The Sisters Are Alright: Changing the Broken Narrative of Black Women
Osheta Moore
Shalom Sisters: Living Wholeheartedly in a Brokenhearted
Sonya Renee Taylor
The Body is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love
Brittney Cooper
Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower
MEMOIR & POETRY & ESSAYS
Amena Brown
Breaking Old Rhythms
Nikki Giovanni
My House
Those Who Ride the Night Winds
Tracy K. Smith
Ordinary Light: A Memoir
Wade in the Water
Emily Bernard
Black is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother’s Time, My Mother’s Time, and Mine
Cupcake Brown
A Piece of Cake: A Memoir
Austin Channing Brown
I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness
Ntozake Shange
For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf
Lucille Clifton
Good Woman: Poems and a Memoir
Phoebe Robinson
You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Stories I Still Have to Explain
Issa Rae
The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl
Imani Perry
Breathe: A Letter to My Sons
Jesmyn Ward
Sing, Unburied, Sing (fiction)
Men We Reaped: A Memoir
Navigate Your Stars
Marilyn Nelson
Carver: A Life in Poems
Tanya Manning-Yarde
Every Watering Word
Alexandra Elle
Neon Soul: A Collection of Poetry and Prose
Margo Jefferson
Negroland: A Memoir
Maya Angelou
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Mom & Me & Mom
Letter to My Daughters
Michelle Obama
Becoming
Roxane Gay
Bad Feminist: Essays
Not That Bad: Dispatches from Rape Culture
Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body
Safia Elhillo
The January Children
Tressie McMillian Cottom
Thick: And Other Essays by Tressie McMillian Cottom
Patrice Gopo
All the Colors We Will See: Reflections on Barriers, Brokeness and Finding Our Way
Natasha Sistrunk Robinson
A Sojourner’s Truth: Choosing Freedom and Courage in a Divided World
Zadie Smith
Feel Free
Morgan Jenkins
This Will Be My Undoing: Living at the Intersection of Black, Female, and Feminist in (White) America
Glory Edim
Well-Read Black Girl: Finding Our Stories, Discovering Ourselves
bell hooks
Sisters of the Yam: Black Women and Self-Recovery
Sybrina Fulton
Rest in Power: The Enduring Life of Trayvon Martin
Elizabeth Alexander
The Light of the World, A Memoir
Rabbit, A Memoir
Patricia Williams
FICTION
Zora Neale Hurston
Their Eyes Were Watching God
Dust Tracks on a Road
Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”
Toni Morrison
Sula
The Bluest Eye
Beloved
Tar Baby
Song of Solomon
Chimamanda Adichie
Americanah
We Should All Be Feminist (TED Talk)
Alice Walker
The Color Purple
The Same River Twice (memoir)
Delores Phillips
The Darkest Child
Sister Souljah
The Coldest Winter Ever: A Novel
Danielle Evans
Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
Margaret Wilkerson Sexton
The Revisioners
COOKBOOKS
Jerrelle Guy
Black Girl Baking
Edna Lewis
The Taste of Country Cooking
Toni Tipton-Martin
Jubilee: Recipes from Two Centuries of African American Cookin g
Abby Fisher
What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking
CHILDREN’S & YA
Tomi Adeyemi
Children of Blood and Bone
Jacqueline Woodson
Brown Girl Dreaming
Red at the Bone
Virginia Hamilton
Her Stories: African American Folktales, Fairy Tales and True Tales
The People Could Fly
Many Thousand Gone
Sherley Anne Williams
Working Cotton
Gwendolyn Brooks
Bronzeville Boys and Girls
Angie Thomas
The Hate U Give
On the Come Up
Jewell Parker Rhodes
Ghost Boys
Ruby Bridges
Ruby Bridges Goes to School: My True Story
Octavia E. Butler
Parable of the Sower
Edwidge Danticat
Mama’s Nightingale: A Story of Immigration
Trillia J. Newbell
God’s Very Good Idea
United: Captured By God’s Vision for Diversity (non-fiction)
Anne Moody
Coming of Age in Mississippi: The Classic Autobiography of Growing Up Poor and Black in the Rural South
Nikki Grimes
Ordinary Hazard
