It’s Lit
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With On the Come Up, Bestselling Author Angie Thomas Continues Her Crusade: ‘I Can See Myself Writing About Black Girls From Here on Out’
Angie Thomas, author of the breakout novel The Hate U Give, remains steadfast about the types of stories she wants to tell, how she wants to tell them and to whom she’s speaking. In the poignant, powerful debut—pegged a “Black Lives Matter book”—Thomas introduced us to 16-year-old Starr Carter, a witty, complicated, code-switching black girl…
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On Reading Kiese Laymon’s Singular and Indestructible Heavy on the 5th Anniversary of My Mom’s Death
With his devastating and resplendent and transcendent Heavy, Kiese Laymon conjured, created and gave us a thing that each person who conjures, creates and gives things aspires to do, and that’s to create a thing that only he could have created. Of course, for the people who conjure, create and give things for a living,…
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Beyond the Blue
Vibrantly glowing inside a dark hall, a small ball of fire burned suspended midair. The flaming orb bounced upward, lingering shortly, before landing in Princess Inara’s palm. Her brown eyes stared intently into the flame as if it were a mystical crystal ball. Unfortunately, she found no answers to her problems hidden within the circular…
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Dominate
I wanted to believe it didn’t mean anything. The smell of whiskey on his breath. The hurried kiss and his tongue latched around my left nipple. The gentle suckling as my abrasive wool sweater remained bunched against my throat. I told myself it meant nothing and I was nothing but an ends to a means.…
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The Takedown
“And that was when Mr. Bailey groped you?” the human resources manager’s face showed no trace of emotion. He had put a box of tissues on the table, setting it down with a dull thud. The tissue sticking up looked like a staircase that went nowhere. “Yes,” Megan said. “He closed the blinds, locked the…
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Birthday Boy
Kuokoa B. Mchango was certain that it was the last night he would be alive, for you see, tomorrow was his 28th birthday. As he lay in his fold-out cot and stared at the low ceiling, he realized with a twinge of sadness that this fact didn’t bother him nearly as much as it used…