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  • And After Many Days: A New Nigerian Novelist Publishes a Highly Anticipated Debut Work

    On a Monday afternoon in 1995 during Nigeria’s rainy season, Paul Utu, the eldest of three children, leaves home and does not return. Thus begins Jowhor Ile’s highly anticipated debut novel, And After Many Days. Jowhor Ile, the 10th child of Nigerian parents, was born and raised in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, and now makes his…

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  • Books by Black Authors to Look Forward to in 2016

    It is no secret that “African-American women are the largest group of readers in the country,” states Dawn Davis, head of Simon & Schuster’s 37 Ink imprint. It is also no secret that the publishing world is very, very white, with books by black authors published at an abysmal low, never rising above 10 percent…

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  • Why Are Democrats Still Chasing White Voters When Brown and Black Is Where It’s At?

    “For hundreds of years, what most mattered in America was whether you were White or not, and that question has continued to be the driving force in our politics, as consultants and candidates have competed for the support of White swing voters thought to be essential to winning elections,” writes Steve Phillips in the opening…

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  • Nnedi Okorafor Is Putting Africans at the Center of Science Fiction and Fantasy

    “In postapocalyptic and apocalyptic narratives when they show the whole world freaking out about something that is happening to the Earth, they never show Africa,” says Nnedi Okorafor, the author of 11 books of science fiction and fantasy, among them the award-winning Zahra the Windseeker, The Book of Phoenix and Who Fears Death. “I wasn’t…

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  • Kevin Powell: The Evolution of an Activist  

    “There are folks who think I’m just a writer, and that is absolutely untrue,” Kevin Powell begins. “I’ve been an activist for 30 years.” He has just gotten off the phone with a woman from Guyana who is seeking his help to obtain an organ transplant for her sick father in New Jersey. Powell, one…

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  • 14 of the Best Nonfiction Books by Black Authors in 2015

    Hope Wabuke is a Southern California-based writer and a contributing editor at The Root. Follow her on Twitter.

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  • 15 Powerful Works of Fiction Published by Black Authors in 2015

    T Hope Wabuke is a Southern California-based writer and a contributing editor at The Root. Follow her on Twitter.

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  • Why Shonda Rhimes Chose to Celebrate a Year of Yes

    If anyone should write a book on how to live life, it is Shonda Rhimes. The award-winning, highly successful TV producer has created an empire of hit TV shows in a field that is notoriously closed to women, not to mention women of color. As creator, executive producer and writer of three hit TV shows—Grey’s…

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  • Remembering the Forgotten Black Heroes of WWII

    Traditionally, African Americans have been absent from the combat narratives of World War II, especially the D-Day invasion of Normandy. The collective story from military historians has long been that “the only black soldiers to land on D-Day had lent their muscle to labor units and other support work.” But this is not the case…

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  • A Mother’s Nurturing Love Shines Brightly in Ordinary Light

    She left us at night,” writes Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Tracy K. Smith in the opening of her new memoir, Ordinary Light, which was just nominated for the National Book Award in nonfiction. “She’d been lifting her hand to signal for relief, a code we’d concocted once it became too much effort for her to speak and…

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