Thread by @brfranklin4

It's #BlackHistoryMonth! A 1-per-day thread of 28 books by Black authors or about Black history that I've read, learned from & recommend.
#1-Martin Luther King, Jr., *Letter from a Birmingham Jail.* This prophetic epistle rocked my world on 1st read, & it continues to speak. 1/28

#2 - Ida B. Wells, *Southern Horrors.* I never knew. I never knew about the prominence of lynching & never thought about its legacy, until I read Ida Wells (Barnett) for the 1st time in grad school. #BlackLivesMatter #BlackHistoryMonth 2/28

Jackie Robinson, *I Never Had it Made.* His heroic integration of baseball ☑️. But also his childhood, WWII service, Civil Rights, marriage, parenthood & his incisive critique of the GOP, which he served & then left, b/c of its treatment of Black Americans.#BlackHistoryMonth 3/28

#4 - Toni Morrison, *Beloved.* There’s a reason Morrison won the Pulitzer & Nobel. It's packed w/ feeling & unflinching honesty about the life & legacy of racialized slavery in the U.S. Some folks want to ban it? Nope. *More* people need to read it. #BlackHistoryMonth 4/28

#5-@agordonreed, *The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family.* Truly pathbreaking story of the Sally Hemings family & their complex ties to Thomas Jefferson & *their* home at Monticello. 1st African American author to win @PulitzerPrizes for History. #BlackHistoryMonth 5/28

#6-@esaumccaulley, *Reading While Black.* 1st Sabbath in #BlackHistoryMonth calls for such a book. How the Black church tradition gives a unique & hopeful biblical interpretation for many of the critical issues of our day (racial strife, policing, & justice). Love this book. 6/28

#7- WEB DuBois, *The Souls of Black Folk.* 1st published 1903, a still-incredible reflection on American society—black & white—in the decades after the Civil War. DuBois was the 1st Black American to earn a PhD @Harvard & he’s been teaching us ever since. #BlackHistoryMonth 7/28

#8 - Richard Wright, *Native Son.* For me, this is one of those handful of novels I’ll never forget. When I read it. Where I was. How it hit me. Wright’s work has apparently been doing that to a lot of people since this novel burst into the scene in 1940. #BlackHistoryMonth 8/28

#9 - Frederick Douglass, *Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.* There was a whole genre of autobiographical “slave narratives” in 19th-century US. I’ve read 6 or so & this classic is still my favorite. Prophetic, educational, & inspirational. #BlackHistoryMonth 9/28

#10 - Bryan Stevenson, *Just Mercy.* An eye-opening & inspiring true story about the deep racial injustices embedded in our criminal justice system, & Stevenson’s heroic fight for equitable, just, mercy. Check out @eji_org for how you can get involved. #BlackHistoryMonth 10/28

#11-@ericaadunbar, *Never Caught.* This story does 2 amazing things:
1)Gives us Ona Judge's story, a woman enslaved, who escaped to freedom.
2)Shines a new light on a hard truth-President Washington wasn't a reluctant enslaver. He actively worked at it. #BlackHistoryMonth 11/28

#12 - Melba Patillo Beals, *Warriors Don’t Cry.* A decade before MLK’s “I Have a Dream,” Beals & 8 classmates—the 1st Black students—bravely walked into Little Rock High. They endured brutal physical & verbal abuse, changed our world, & deserve our honor. #BlackHistoryMonth 12/28

#13- @ThabitiAnyabwil, *The Faithful Preacher.* For the 2nd Sabbath of #BlackHistoryMonth. 1/2 biography of 3 Black preachers (Lemuel Haynes, Daniel Payne, & Francis Grimké); 1/2 collection of their sermons; all prophetic & encouraging words to the Christian Church. 13/28

#14 - For #ValentinesDay, Peter Wallenstein’s book on Mildred Jeter & Richard Loving, a Virginian couple who got married in 1958…& got thrown in prison. This is the story of American laws against interracial marriage & how 2 heroes changed our world. #BlackHistoryMonth 14/28

#15- Zora Neal Hurston, *Their Eyes Were Watching God.* A classic story of a woman’s search for love in rural Florida 100 years ago. One of the most unique novels I’ve ever read. #BlackHistoryMonth 15/28

#16- Ernest Gaines, *A Lesson Before Dying.* Am intimate story of a young black man on death row in 1940s Louisiana & a local school teacher who befriends & learns from him. National Book Award winner, Pulitzer nominee, powerful read. #BlackHistoryMonth 16/28

#17- James Baldwin, *The Fire Next Time.* I want to be careful, but also have to be effusive - this book (really 2 essays) is probably the most powerful reflection I’ve ever read on race, history, religion & a Black man’s experience in America. #BlackHistoryMonth 17/28

#18- Albert J. Raboteau, *Slave Religion.* The classic book on the beliefs & day-to-day religious lives of enslaved people & communities in early America. #BlackHistoryMonth 18/28

#19-Phillis Wheatley, *Poems.* In he 1770s, Wheatley was the 1st African American author to publish a book of poetry. Her life & work are a testament to the perseverance of human beauty in any circumstance. #BlackHistoryMonth 19/28

#20- @Irwyn Ince, *The Beautiful Community.* For the 3rd Sabbath of #BlackHistoryMonth, a book about the beauty of purposeful, communal diversity in the church. 20/28

#21- @atticalocke, *Bluebird, Bluebird.* Features a modern-day Black Texas Ranger protagonist making his way through the tangled webs of race, law, history & society in East TX. #BlackHistoryMonth 21/28

#22 - Solomon Northup, *12 Years a Slave.* An incredible, gripping, & heroic true story of Solomon Northup, born free in NY, kidnapped & sold into slavery in DC, & enslaved in Louisiana for 12 years before reclaiming his freedom. #BlackHistoryMonth 22/28

#23-@MarcusRediker, *The Amistad Rebellion.* A 2for: 1) The amazing story of the men who rose up across oceans & in #SCOTUS to seize freedom; 2) Remembering John Quincy Adams: their courageous lawyer & likely my favorite president, on the day of his death #BlackHistoryMonth 23/28

#24- Booker T. Washington, *Up from Slavery.* Washington tells his own inspiring story of slavery, freedom, hard work, entrepreneurship & education, in a world which didn’t necessarily value those stories coming from Black Americans. #BlackHistoryMonth 24/28

#25-@colsonwhitehead, *The Underground Railroad.* A highly original, fascinating & haunting fictional tale about a woman attempting to escape slavery on a (literal) Underground Railroad. @PulitzerPrizes & National Book Award & deserves to be on your list. #BlackHistoryMonth 25/28

#26 - Ralph Ellison, *Invisible Man.* I still clearly remember being assigned this in my junior year of high school. And boy did it stick (a single dot of black to make optic white paint!). An intense read, but an ultimately good one. #BlackHistoryMonth 26/28

#27- @trillianewbell, *God’s Very Good Idea.* For the 4th Sabbath of #BlackHistoryMonth, a little something different. A favorite children’s book in my family, which highlights God’s purposeful, beautiful, diverse creation of (& love for) human beings. 27/28

#28- @BarackObama, *Dreams from My Father.* Seemed a fitting place to close #BlackHistoryMonth. Published 1995, when hardly anyone outside Illinois knew him. Tells his remarkable story from Hawaii to Indonesia to the USA. Full of poignant reflections on life, race & family. 28/28

@threadreaderapp unroll please :)