Must Read Books For Black History Month

A Promised Land is a former President Barack Obama's fourth book, but this time around he reflects on his political career, from his early races through his time in the White House. A New York Time's best-seller, Obama said this book provides "an honest accounting of my presidency, the forces we grapple with as a nation, and how we can heal our divisions and make democracy work for everybody."

Cicely Tyson lived. The actress, artist, and muse passed away at 96, but while she graced the Earth with her presence, Tyson lived and extraordinary life. In her memoir, Just As I Am, Tyson promises to give readers a "plain and unvarnished" look at her amazing life "with the glitter and garland set aside."

Zami: A New Spelling of My Name is an autobiography by the iconic poet Audre Lorde, and a love letter to the Black women in Lorde’s life. According to the New York Times, with this book Lorde is credited with birthing a new genre of memoir called "biomythography," which combines history, biography, and myth.

Lorde writes that "Zami" is a “Carriacou name for women who work together as friends and lovers." Carriacou is an island of the Grenadine Islands, where Lorde’s mother immigrated from.

A New York Times best seller, this influential memoir by Janet Mock (actress, trans rights advocate, and director/producer on FX’s hit show POSE) chronicles her experience growing as a multiracial, low-income, and trans girl in Hawaii. It’s a crucial read — both heartbreaking and inspiring — that shows readers the journey Mock went on to embrace her identity and fearlessly claim space for herself.

Style and pop culture expert Tanisha C. Ford deep dives into Black women's style across decades — from afros and dashikis in the 70s, to hip-hop influenced '90s looks and beyond. Ford's Dressed in Dreams is a self-described love letter to Black women and their fashion. 

When Suzette returns home to L.A from her New England boarding school, she’s confused about who she is, what she wants, and where she wants to be. As she settles back into her life, she starts to begin a relationship with her longtime crush Emil and tries to support her stepbrother Lionel, who has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. But things quickly unravel when Suzette starts to fall for someone else… who happens to be the same girl her brother is in love with. 

Little & Lion is a beautiful coming-of-age Young Adult novel exploring questions of love, identity, mental illness, friendship, and family. It’s also a portrayal of a Black Jewish girl, an identity not frequently represented in the genre.

In this stunning debut by Ghanian-American novelist Yaa Gyasi, readers meet the descendant of an Asante woman named Maame through her two daughters, separated half-sisters. One sister, Effia marries the British governor in charge of Cape Coast Castle, where her sister Esi is tortured and held captive in the slave dungeons right below her. Homegoing follows these two families, separated by the brutality and complexities of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.

Written from Cuba, where she currently has asylum, Assata explores Assata Shakur’s journey to becoming revolutionary. Shakur discusses many events in her life, focusing on the aftermath of the notorious New Jersey State Turnpike shooting, which led to Shakur being convicted and imprisoned due to the murder of a police officer (although she later escaped and fled to Cuba). As a prominent former member of the Black Liberation Army, Shakur has inspired many social movements, and understanding her story is key to understanding Black resistance in the United States.

The Mothers is a book about missed chances, and how the possibilities of all that can never be stay with us forever. Nadia Turner, a seventeen-year old beauty mourning the death of her mother, starts a heady summer romance with Luke Sheppard, the pastor’s son whose football injury has forced him to wait tables at a diner instead of chasing football stardom. When Nadia becomes pregnant, she keeps it a secret from everyone. But years later, that secret threatens to destroy everything Nadia, Luke, and Nadia’s best friend Aubrey hold dear.

In this remarkable collection of memoir in essays, Nigerian-American immigrant and former slam poet, Bassey Ikpi explores her life through her experiences with mental illness and Bipolar II Disorder. Just as the title says, I’m Telling The Truth But I’m Lying is an exercise in radical honesty, while also navigating the ways our minds inform our perspectives.

Winner of the 1977 Newbery Medal, Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry is a novel about life in southern Mississippi during the Great Depression and the Jim Crow era. It’s heartbreaking and illuminating to watch 9-year old Cassie Logan learn that racial terror is just the way of life she must become accustomed to in order to survive.

This book is essential reading if you want to understand some of the foundations of Black feminist scholarship. With contributions from Alice Walker, Michelle Wallace, and the Combahee River Collective, this anthology is critical to examining the ways anti-Blackness and gender discrimination combine to shape the experiences of Black women.

Often called "the Bible” of criminal justice reform, Michelle Alexander’s groundbreaking book about how the U.S. has decimated communities of color through mass incarceration fueled countless social movements protesting this modern day form of slavery. The book is a crucial read if you want to understand the link between slavery, Jim Crow, mass incarceration, and racism in the United States.

In this collection of essays, interviews, and speeches, world-renowned activist and scholar Angela Y. Davis shows readers that across the globe, struggles against state violence and oppression are linked. This bold and courageous book also calls for international solidarity among oppressed groups — especially between Black Americans and Palestinians.

Sing, Unburied, Sing is a nearly perfect novel. Most of it takes place on a dangerous road trip through Mississippi, to the notorious maximum security prison, Parchman. Set in the twenty-first-century rural South, this chilling book shows us that the horrific legacy of racial terror is very much alive today.

Under the Udala Trees is a powerful novel about war, coming of age, and the dangers that arise when one decides to live an independent, open life.  When 11-year-old Ijeoma is sent away to safety as civil war ravages the newly independent republic of Nigeria, she meets another girl from a different ethnic community and they fall in love. Ijeoma quickly learns that she must bury this part of her identity to survive. But at what cost?

Just like the #DisabledandCute viral campaign she created, disability rights advocate Keah Brown’s debut is fresh, inspiring, relatable, honest, and yes… cute.  This collection of essays explores what it means to be Black and disabled in a mostly able-bodied white America when everything from romantic relationships and media seems fraught with discrimination.

Published when she was only 25, Breath, Eyes, Memory is Haitian-American writer Edwidge Danticat's first novel. The book’s main character, Sophie, is raised by her aunt in Haiti and is the product of a violent rape. When Sophie turns 12, she’s suddenly ripped from her life in the village, and sent to Brooklyn to live with her mother. Breath, Eyes, Memory explores Sophie’s complicated relationship with her mother, and her struggles to the break cycle of intergenerational trauma.

Winner of the 2019 Kirkus Prize in Nonfiction, Saeed Jones’s beautiful memoir tells how he — as a young, Black, gay man from the South — had to fight to claim his own identity.  Exploring complicated relationships with his family, friends, and lovers, Jones paints a compelling portrait of the beauty of queerness, race, love, and self-actualization.

Written by acclaimed Trinidadian historian C.L.R. James, The Black Jacobins is a thrilling account of the most successful slave rebellion, the Haitian Revolution. Taking place between 1794-1803, the unprecedented event inspired liberation movements and slave rebellions in Africa, the U.S., and Cuba. Much of the book follows Toussaint L'Ouverture, the Haitian icon who successfully led enslaved Black people as they fought off French, Spanish, and English invaders, paving the way for Haiti to become the first independent nation in the Caribbean.