
This week’s book club features three stories (real and fictional) of unique lives and takes on what it means to grow up black in America, coming up against expectations and prejudices, and having to define yourself as a result of and in spite of those terms. They’re lives of activists, performers, teachers, students, comedians; lives of anger and frustration and joy and humor and change. They’re meant to be fleshed-out and multifaceted lives, not symbolic, and deal with the power of narrative and representation; if your story isn’t being told, you have to tell it.
<em><a data-affiliate-link="" href="https://www.amazon.com/No-Ashes-Fire-Coming-America/dp/1568589484?tag=bm01f-20" rel="noskim" target="_blank">No Ashes In the Fire: Coming of Age Black & Free In America</a></em>
<em>So Close to Being the Sh*t, Y’all Don’t Even Know</em>
<em>They Come in All Colors</em>
Ilana Lucas
Ilana is an English professor, theatre consultant and playwright based in Toronto, Canada. When she’s not at the theatre or insisting that literary criticism can be fun, she’s singing a cappella or Mozart, occasionally harmonizing with the symphony, or playing “Under Pressure” with her rock handbell group, Pavlov’s Dogs.