​In 1999, right before I turned sixteen, my mother attended the annual Black Expo held at the Jacob Javitz Center in New York City. My family went every year. I went a few times, but for whatever reason, that year I didn’t. I was curled up in the living room chair when she returned home and handed me the book. She said, “Sister Souljah has a new book out. I got it for you.”
I said, “Thanks, Mom.”
We were avid readers in my house, particularly of Black literature. There were a few Danielle Steel books on my mother’s shelf, but she and my aunts read all of Terry McMillan’s books, Kimberla Lawson Roby, Toni Morrison, Beverly Jenkins, and Donald Goines. I was no stranger to the range of Black literature available. So this type of exchange was the norm for us.
Immediately, from the first page, I was hooked on The Coldest Winter Ever. Who is this Winter Santiaga talking about, “I came busting out of my momma’s big coochie on January 28, 1977, during one of New York’s worst snowstorms?” I needed to know more. I literally devoured the book in three nights and then called my best friend (a reading partner to this day), like, “Gurl, you’ve got to read this book!”
My life was the furthest thing from Winter’s. I lived in a modest two-story home, owned by my grandmother, who was a full-time detox nurse; my mother was a stay-at-home mom, and my aunt was a beautician with her own salon. I was raised on the belief that to get what you wanted, you needed God, an education, and a solid job. I knew nothing about the inner workings of the ghetto fabulous lifestyles of inner-city drug dealers. I’m from The Bronx; I knew a lot of young drug dealers—but I knew them in passing. All the designers mentioned in the book and the amounts of cash being handled, were things the adults- mainly my aunt had while I was growing up. Winter’s access to these wild and intriguing adult endeavors blew my mind. I ended up reading the book several times. Now, in my forties, I can’t say how many times I’ve read the book.

I used to fantasize about the book being a film. I desperately wanted to see it come to life. I think I was in my twenties when I heard the rumor that Jada Pinkett-Smith had bought the rights to the story and was going to produce the film. Sister Souljah cleared that up recently, saying that the rights were never sold and she’s not interested in a film production, though it was once a conversation, and that’s where the rumor stemmed from.
It took twenty-two years for Sister Souljah to release the sequel, Life After Death, which many fans turned their noses up at and walked away from. Bad reviews did not deter me. I read it from cover to cover. I can’t gobble books the way I used to, so it took me about two weeks to finish it. Some parts definitely terrified me because I am not a fan of literature and movies that discuss the devil. I persevered, though, and was glad to make it to the end. My lifelong bestie and reading partner persevered as well, and we agreed that we both enjoyed it. Three years later, Love After Midnight was released and received similar reviews. I remained undeterred and endured to the end. Admittedly, the pacing confused me, and Winter still annoyed me. By my thirties, I was no longer fascinated by her stupidity, but rather annoyed by it, yet I remained enamored with the cautionary storyline. Readers want Winter to grow up, and they seem to be mad at Sister Souljah that she’s not. I’ve accepted Winter for who she is because I know people like her in reality. That’s what makes Winter’s character so real to me. She’s no different from a few homegirls and homeboys, I might as well say, that I’ve known for many years and mentally outgrown. Winter’s story is more common than we realize.
Anyway, lately, more and more people are using AI to create TCWE movie trailers. One young lady has been making chapter clips, and she is crushing it. I stumbled across her page on Facebook, where she apparently has another ongoing AI series that people are hooked on. I literally “tune in” twice a week to watch these mini episodes.
Now, I am not a fan of visuals generated by AI. I’ve messed around with it myself, but social media is now oversaturated with all the same flyers, and it just seems like people have given up on visual creativity altogether. I refuse. I will spend hours on Canva and stock photo sites to create visuals before I throw a few words into a prompt to get the same flyer as half the people in my newsfeed for my own vastly different events and business endeavors.
However, I can see the work that goes into this young lady’s TCWE video clips, and I am awestruck. I commented on one of her posts that this is how generative AI should be used. Millennial women who enjoyed TCWE the way I did can truly appreciate the way her attention to detail taps into our nostalgia and brings us back to the story that turned many of us on to Urban Lit. I’m obsessed.

​A fourth book is on the way: A Beautiful Evil, and yes, I am going to order the hardcover and read it. I need a hardcover copy of TCWE (hints for those who know me). To this day, I still have the original paperback copy that my mother bought me. The front of the cover has fallen off; the pages are yellow—yeah, it doesn’t stand up to the others on my shelf. I need that hardcover for book nook aesthetics. I also hope this young lady on Facebook (and YouTube) continues making TCWE clips for the entire book, and I hope she’s inspired and encouraged to do the whole franchise. Others have tried to replicate the book visually, and one was so bad: Winter looked twelve for the entire clip and wore a jail suit in every scene; it was nuts. However, the young lady I’m raving about really takes her time with a score/soundtrack, quoted dialogue, and as much visual detail as she can with the AI tools she’s working with. I don’t know how she would feel about me mentioning her in my blog, so I haven’t said her name. But if she catches wind of this, I would eventually come back, make edits, and add her name/production company.
In the meantime, I’ll be waiting for Thursday night’s episode. Child services came and took the kids lol. I’m looking forward to Winter and Lana’s visit to the prison—I think that’s what’s next. I’m tempted to pull out my old copy to follow along, but I’m already reading three books. I’ll just enjoy my episodes and wait on A Beautiful Evil.

Back in March of this year, I listened to Diahann Carroll’s memoir, The Legs Are the Last to Go. This is a memoir that left me full and touched on many different emotions. First of all, I LOVE Diahann Carroll. I have been fascinated by her since childhood. For me, she made her biggest impression while on A Different World as Whitley Gilbert-Wayne’s mother, Marion Gilbert. A Different World was one of my favorite shows, and I felt that Diahann Carroll was everything Whitley Gilbert’s mother should be. One of my mother’s and aunt’s favorite movies is Claudine, and while so many things hit close to home as a Black woman of any generation, as a child I was intrigued by Carroll’s ability to play such vastly different women. Then, because my aunt lived for Dynasty, I also became privy to Carroll’s role as Dominique Deveraux. The more I saw Carroll, the more I wanted to see. Early on, she was a role model and icon in my young mind, and I watched everything she was in.

​One of the things that surprised me was how she felt about her mother. Across the African diaspora, we carry this reverence for our parents, especially our mothers. Unfortunately, many of our mothers carry the brunt of child-rearing. (I used to joke that I wanted to be the daddy, so I could just not have time to do things, just return my child to the mommy, and not have to figure anything out, but rather leave the thinking to the mommy.) Anyway, this veneration causes us to ignore, bury, or simply not speak on our negative feelings at all toward our mothers. As of late, Millennials (my generation) are learning to be honest about how we feel about our mothers (thanks to therapy for many of us). So I was surprised that someone of an older generation could be so real about not only what she observed of her mother, but how she felt about her. It was refreshing.

Carroll approaches every stage of her life with blatant honesty. She kept it 100 about everything that happened, as well as her reactions and feelings, and whether her actions and reactions were right, wrong, or appropriate. Not only was she honest about her feelings toward her mother, but she also reflected on the type of mother she was and what she could’ve done better. I believe that is the reason why her relationship with her daughter was strong. I loved listening to the end when she talked about the type of grandmother she was. Again, she didn’t try to be anyone other than who she was, and she didn’t create a false granny who wears her hair in a bun and bakes cookies. She bought her grandchildren attire meant for ladies and gentlemen, and though small children aren’t always interested in that sort of thing (particularly the labels) it’ll be a source of warm memories when they are older.
I was impressed with the highs of her career and how she handled the lows. I was surprised that she just barely mentioned her time on A Different World, and I wonder if there’s anything to that. Carroll was candid about most things, though, and I imagine that had to be cathartic for her. Also, at her age, who was going to check her?

​Of course, this was a 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 listen for me. Diahann Carroll gave me everything I wanted, needed, and more in this sincere reflection of her life. This memoir is now on my list of “must-reads.” She called this book The Legs Are the Last to Go, but Carroll’s impact on my life is here to stay.

I don’t know what I expected when I pressed play on Kamala Harris’s The Truths We Hold. I thought I was starting the year off strong with this listen. I don’t want to take anything away from her by saying it wasn’t a strong start, but I wasn’t necessarily entertained. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been looking for that, right? Maybe I was looking for more clues that she was a “Sista…” I really don’t know. Now that I no longer have an hour-long commute, I listen to my audiobooks while in the gym. I only spend about forty-five minutes, five days a week, working out. If I don’t feel well, have an early appointment, or have an early client, I might shorten my workout time or skip the gym altogether, which means I tend to skip listening to a book, and then of course, I find myself behind the rest of the club in reading. So with all that said, yes, it took me longer than everyone else to finish The Truths We Hold.  I finished, though!

There were very few parts that made me have out-loud reactions. But I laughed hard when she had to tell her husband, in their dating stage, how a “girls’ trip” worked. I loved that part for so many reasons. Anyone on screen, guarded by security, whether an entertainer or politician, is usually seen as larger than life. Listening to their human experiences reminds us regular folk that these people are just that—people. Hearing that the vice president had to tell the guy that she was talking to that she had a “girls’ trip” planned made her relatable. That anecdote also revealed what type of woman she was in her relationships. She’s loyal to her friends and straightforward with her partner. She’s also not a pick me. I loved every bit of that short story.

When Vice President Harris ran for office, there was much emphasis on her being responsible for putting a lot of Black men behind bars. When this was a hot topic, I didn’t get involved. I wasn’t informed enough to speak on it, and I am also of the mindset that if someone did the crime, they must do some time. You will never see a post from me stating “Free him/her,” if I knew they for sure did the crime. Now, the amount of time is what matters to me, and it’s what I feel must be scrutinized and should be consistent in terms of race and class. Listening to The Truths We Hold, I learned that Vice President Harris was responsible for Back on Track, an initiative to rehabilitate first-time and nonviolent offenders. I was impressed with her efforts and thought it was a strong counter to the claim that she’d put so many Black men in jail.

I was also impressed with her fight for fair mortgage rates. Buying a home is in my very near future, my grandmother recently sold her second home, and my father is a rental property owner. Real estate, mortgages, property taxes, and values are words that come up several times a week for me, so when I hear them anywhere else, I lock in. Vice President Harris’s efforts to improve the mortgage rates in parts of California softened my impression of her as well. It made her even more relatable to me.
 
As a Black woman, I have this need to constantly prove myself, and I suppose I look for that in other Black women as well. I want them to pull out all the stops and make an effort to put their accomplishments on display to prove that we are good enough. Maybe that’s what I was looking for while listening to Vice President Harris’s memoir. I also think that she did just that; she proved herself, but without sounding boastful. It taught me that my efforts and work speak for themselves, and I don’t have to start every conversation with how many degrees I have and what I’m capable of. The proof is in the results, right?

​One last thing… I think because politicians tend to be very charismatic on the mic or behind a podium, I expect them to be this way all the time. Barack Obama’s books had me hooked from start to finish, while Michelle Obama possibly had a little more tea, she wasn’t as charismatic. Her reading voice could put me to sleep. Vice President Harris’s reading voice is choppy lol. She does not read as well as she speaks. Maybe she needed more rehearsal, maybe she was nervous, but she sounded like a teacher reading to her class for the first time. I powered through, though, and I’m glad that I did. I learned a lot, and my appreciation for her has deepened. I felt it was a four-glass read, and that’s my truth!

I love Whoopi Goldberg. I have since I was a little girl. She fascinated me. I was intrigued by her ability to be Ceelie in The Color Purple, and both fascinated and amused by her in Jumping Jack Flash. Over the years I grew to love her more and more. She stood in her truth regardless of what media and now what social media had to say. She faced backlash for social mishaps and showed her humanness in ways that were inspiring to others. Her memoir, Bits and Pieces: My Mother, My Brother, and Me took her transparency to another level.

​If you’re looking for behind analyses of some of her public issues in this memoir, you will not get it. Instead, Whoopi opens up about who she is and why she is who she is. Her mother is a huge part of the woman we see, know, and love as Whoopi Goldberg. Born Karen Johnson in the Chelsea Projects in New York, Whoopi grew up with her mother Emma and brother Clyde. She describes her mother and brother as a “lockstep duo” by the time she was born, but she surely rounded out their trio.

​Whoopi was an independent child who indulged her own joys and chased her own passions. This was not by accident. Emma raised both children predominantly on her own. When I said predominantly, I mean, her children knew their father, but she’d split from her husband early enough so that they didn’t exactly miss his presence. Other than that Whoopi and her brother grew up close to various relatives on her mother’s side of the family. She remembers a time when she was a small child, and her mother experienced a nervous breakdown and was hospitalized for an extended period of time. Meanwhile, adults looked out for Whoopi and her brother, but they mostly took care of themselves. They had gained so much independence from Emma that even as children under thirteen, they were fine on their own.
 
Today, we see Whoopi as an individual trendsetter. In her position on The View, she is known to stand her ground and present her opinions supported by strong facts and experiences. This stems from the type of parent Emma was. She supported her children’s endeavors and asked very little of them. Asking little doesn’t mean she had low expectations. She did expect young Whoopi and Clyde to put their best foot forward in all that they did; however, she didn’t demand success in areas that didn’t interest them. Imagine if she had demanded that Whoopi not cross the country as a teen mom in pursuit of a Hollywood career. She probably wouldn’t be the EGOT winner inspiring Black women across the globe.
 
The only thing I find flawed with Emma as a parent, and this is my humble opinion because I am clearly a flawed parent myself, is that she hid so much of herself from her children that they never had a chance to experience her vulnerabilities. I think it’s important for our children to see us as vulnerable human beings, particularly when they reach adulthood. I think the respect deepens when we see the Clark Kent side of our parents. Again, this is just my opinion, I am lightyears younger than Emma and Whoopi, and an imperfect parent.
 
At the start of the book, Whoopi talks about losing her mother and brother back-to-back. Though she’s very straightforward and lighthearted in her approach, the events are heartbreaking. I have enough siblings to fill a minivan, and I can’t imagine losing a parent and then one of them right after. Whoopi’s losses sound devastating; however, I think she has reconciled her grief knowing that she has so much to offer the family she created with her daughter and grandchildren, as well as her devoted fans.

​As I mentioned earlier, this book wasn’t salacious. Whoopi didn’t drop names. She told stories of her past and painted the map to her success with her mother and brother as her constant guides. A lot of Black women experience complicated relationships with their mothers, but Whoopi and Emma’s relationship showed that things don’t have to be as jumbled and hard. It’s also important to appreciate people while you have them. Whoopi, Clyde, and Emma never missed an opportunity to be good and appreciative of each other. That’s a beautiful thing. This was a calming and insightful listen that I recommend for all. It was masterfully written, and I expected nothing less.
 
Five full glasses, cheers!

​I can’t even tell you how I found out about Michelle Buteau. I don’t remember the first role I ever saw her in or anything. All I know is that there was a show, Survival of the Thickest on Netflix, and I was like “oh yes—bring on the ‘brown titty’ drama!”
Watching the show, I couldn’t figure out for the life of me what Buteau’s ethnicity was. I said this girl is hella-racially ambiguous, and I kinda just decided she was Afro-Latina. On the show, she is hilariously relatable, and I loved everything about it and her. Then, earlier this year, a BIBC member told me she has a memoir by the same name as the show. I had to jump on that, and I did—we did.

​Comics are probably my favorite memoir narrators, and Buteau eased herself right into my top ten. If I am captivated by your opening chapter, you’re a winner. She wasn’t even telling her story yet. She was just describing herself as a Jersey girl, and I was cracking up loudly in my car. It’s also in this first chapter that I learn of her Caribbean heritage, and I pat myself on the back for not being too far off because Haiti and the Dominican Republic do share an island, and sometimes there is no way to tell the difference between the people until they speak.
At first, I expected her memoir to be all fun and games. I was also clueless about her age. Since I hadn’t seen or heard of her before Survival of the Thickest on Netflix, I thought she was younger than me or at least, my age. Well, shocker—she’s a whole five years older than me. Her style in college didn’t sound far off from my high school style, and I finally had to piece together that we were not, in fact, the same age.

​The deeper Buteau gets into her story, the more I fall into my fandom. Every human being has insecurities, some bigger or more obvious to the world than others. She talked about one that lasted years that I never would’ve guessed. A BIBC member asked, “Did you get to the part about the tooth?” and I fell out. Naturally, Buteau used her comedic skills to talk about her unruly tooth replacement, and of course, I laughed my head off on my commute. I also felt really bad for her. (I feel like I’m talking like that cartoonish man people voted into office. My vocabulary range is wider than this, I swear.) We all have embarrassing moments. Episodes we wish we could erase from our pasts because they are oh-so-cringeworthy. These are the things that make us human, and hearing someone else’s very human experience, especially a celebrity’s, can be warming and refreshing.
Buteau also talks about her fertility struggles, and that was possibly the only time that I was completely silent while listening to her narration. Every woman’s fertility experience is as different as our fingerprints. There may be similarities, but no two are exactly the same. I’ve been up close and personal with a few situations where women were unable to conceive or sustain a pregnancy, and it’s heartbreaking from the inside out. If I, as the sister, best friend, or niece, am devastated to the point of intrusive grief, I can’t fathom how my sister, best friend, or aunt felt looking at negative pregnancy tests, or no longer hearing a baby’s heartbeat. Then there are the comments people make. Buteau and her husband opted for surrogacy, and as she told this part of her story, I was nervous, excited, and concerned for her emotional well-being the entire time. I was also annoyed with her when people commented alluding that surrogacy was some kind of celebrity privilege. When raised in any type of Christian household, in which Buteau was raised Catholic, the womb is sacred, and sex purely exists for reproduction. So what if you can’t reproduce? What if your womb doesn’t work like everyone else’s? I don’t have celeb-money, and managed to conceive one child with minimal issues in my lifetime, but I would never make such a shallow assumption, let alone speak it out loud. Surrogacy is expensive, but not just financially. To become a mother, we sacrifice pieces of ourselves, physically and emotionally. To trust someone else to carry your child until they can breathe on their own is a sacrifice too, and I’m sure it doesn’t always feel like a privilege. Thankfully, Buteau is the happy mama of twins, a boy and girl, and when she said her babies were born, I was able to exit the Cross Bronx Expressway with an exhale.

I am addicted to using Buteau’s expression “brown titty.” It’s all about the brown titties these days. If I get a lil tipsy and say it too many times in conversation, blame Michelle Buteau. After finishing her memoir, I had to go on and watch The First Wives Club, the series. She was hilarious and I wish there were more than three seasons of all that brown titty camaraderie. Should you listen to her memoir? Hell yes! It was surely a 5-glass-read! I’d give it more if there wasn’t a such thing as alcohol poisoning! Cheers!
🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷

“I’m old, and I like to lie,” Shonda Rhimes said these words in the opening of her memoir and I literally shouted, “Me toooo girl me toooo!”
​
Immediately. I. WAS. LOCKED. IN.
 
I tell people all the time, don’t bother lying to me. I’m bound to catch you. Why? Because I’m great at lying, but I use my powers for good. So no, I don’t go around telling lies to people. Instead I write realistic fiction that is wildly entertaining, and of course, so does Shonda Rhimes, which is why I could immediately relate to her. I’m old and I like to lie too.
 
I wasn’t crazy about Grey’s Anatomy.
I wasn’t crazy about Scandal either.
I did however, admire the hell out of Shonda and her primetime television takeover.
Then How to Get Away With Murder came out, and I was on the Shondaland bandwagon. Every Thursday night my family and friends would tune in at eight and nine for Grey’s and Scandal, but then at ten, it was my turn. I would make sure my daughter’s homework was checked, she had whatever she needed and was in her bed. Then I’d grab my cake or glass of wine, and settle in the middle of my bed to watch my show. I never missed an episode. Although I didn’t get down with the other two shows, I didn’t knock anyone else for it. All of Shondaland was phenomenal in my book.

​So I tune into her memoir and she says all the things I need to hear. She literally touches on every single detail about being a woman. Being a writer. Being a parent. Being a sibling. Being a daughter. She doesn’t necessarily tell her life story from beginning to end. Instead, she talks about how she challenged herself to come out of her shell by agreeing to say YES to opportunities that were literally showing up on her doorstep, for a year. They say that anything you do for fifteen days becomes habit. So what do you think happened to the Year of Yes?
 
I felt that Viola Davis was hella-transparent in her memoir and I didn’t think it could get any deeper than that. I was wrong. Shonda digs deep. She doesn’t hold back discussing depression and how it overlaps with poor self-care. When the world is overstimulating, your imagination is overactive, and things need to get done, it’s easy to ignore fun. The closest I’ve ever been to depths of depression that Shonda talks about, was my postpartum period. All I wanted to do was take care of my baby and play video games. Why do anything else? That led to being severely underweight and digestive issues. In Shonda’s case, it led to being uncomfortably overweight. When she challenged herself to saying YES, it got her off her couch and out her house. It made her aware of her body and she said YES to making it comfortable for herself to live in.
 
The way she talked about simply wanting to live in the world she made up, made me feel so seen as a writer. Sometimes the real world is too overstimulating and it just feels easier to live in our imaginations. Shonda’s thing as a kid was to play with the canned goods in the pantry. She could be in there for hours in her made up world in the darkness of the pantry. I dug it. When I was a kid my mother used to say, “That girl cleans her room just to get ready to play.”
I used to get annoyed but she wasn’t wrong. I was always thinking of how to make space for my Barbies’ world. I was very serious about my Barbies and almost never wanted other girls to play with my dolls because they would mix up the families. I had almost thirty Barbie dolls. They had first, middle, and last names and they had permanent families. Someone gave me a camera and one day I did family photo shoots with my dolls. I posed them with my bedspread as the backdrop and everything. I still have the photos. By the time I was a teenager, I was heavy on The Sims games, and played into my mid-twenties. Sometimes I think about playing The Sims now but it’s better to put my energy into writing and entertaining others with my imaginary families.
 
Most of us probably view Shonda the way we view most celebrities. We think because of the red carpets and speaking engagements that life must be grand. They make it look easy. Then we listen to memoirs like this one and are reminded of their humanity. They have anxiety, insecurities, and flat out fears too. Listening to her memoir was enlightening, inspirational, and uplifting. The theme that struck a chord in me was this: saying YES to opportunities means saying YES to yourself. You’ll never know what you’re fully capable of, and what you truly love without saying YES to life.
 
Forget about a five-star rating for this book. At the end I wanted to shout, “Tens across the board!” IYKYK…
 
Thank you Shonda. I’m old, and I like to lie too, and I hope to gain an audience that enjoys my imagination just like you.

I knew very little about Assata Shakur before listening to her autobiography read by Sirena Riley. Like, I knew she was a revolutionary, but I was unable to place her in my schema of revolutionaries. This is simply because I knew more about the Black Panther Party than the Black Liberation Army. I suppose I was unclear about her because of the most fascinating thing about her; she escaped prison! She would have to be pretty vague to manage that right?
​
Well…
 
Assata left no detail untold about her childhood. Revolutionaries impress me because I often wonder where they pull their strength and gumption from. I admire them because I wish that I had the nerve to do the things they do/did. People say that reading, and writing about the Black experience are revolutionary acts, and maybe I’m downplaying my capabilities, but it feels nothing like standing up to white racists in the south with only a shotgun. These are the things Assata witnessed her grandparents doing throughout her childhood in the south. She came from a strong industrious family who stood their ground and raised the children in their charge to do the same. Her mother became an educator, and her aunt, like most Black aunties, was the more supportive extension of her mother.
Assata grew up with everything she needed, yet her spirit was restless and it took plenty of trial and error for her to figure out what she wanted. She spent her teen years floating and figuring. She even called herself trying to be a pickpocket for a little minute. I laughed hard and loud while listening to her time in “the streets,” cuz girl what?? During this time, she struggled to get along with her mother and leaned more on her aunt.
 
She breaks down the changing of her name and her involvement in the Black Liberation Army. See, she was named JoAnne Deborah Byron at birth (July 16, 1947), but after becoming an activist, she changed her name. Assata Olugbala Shakur is now her full name. Assata means she who struggles, Olugbala means the one who saves, and Shakur means the thankful one. Considering the turns her life has taken, all three names turn out to be quite appropriate. She first became an activist while in college. Yes, with all her teenage shenanigans, Assata still earned her GED with her aunt’s guidance. Like most, college broadened her thinking even further, and she felt the drive to do more for her people. She first joined the Black Panther Party, but after a while she found herself disagreeing with the gender expectations, and soon joined the Black Liberation Army instead.

​May 2, 1973 is when Assata’s story takes a drastic turn. A stop on the New Jersey Turnpike in New Brunswick left Assata shot and wounded as well as one of her comrades Zayd Malik Shakur, who passed away due to his injuries. Officers involved were wounded as well. In the end, Assata was charged with armed robbery, possession of a weapon, assault, and ultimately murder.
 
Assata’s story is told in flashbacks, alternating between her childhood and her arrest. Eventually the two timelines coincide, and her story stops with her escape. I say “stops,” because clearly her story isn’t over. Members of the BIBC discussed shock at how she and Kamau Sadiki managed to not only build an intimate relationship, but also have relations and conceive a child. This is when I found myself driving with my lips pinched together, eyes wide open, attentive to her words. I was deep in my feels, listening to how poorly she was treated and the birth of Kakuya felt like ultimate get-back. Her escape was the cherry on top, because not only do Black people persevere, but we find ways to thrive, and we move on like we are unscarred.
 
Sirena Riley’s narration was crisp, melodic, and relatable. A good narrator can read to you without reading to you, if you know what I mean. Her narration was conversational, yet formal, as if she were being interviewed. As aforementioned, I often listen to my audiobooks on my commute, and it’s important to me that the narration is engaging while I inch my way through traffic. There were parts where I talked back to her, laughed out loud, held my breath, and fought tears all the way to work. When it comes to fiction, these are the signs of a good story, but if we’re talking nonfiction, these are signs of superb narration.
 
I’m not giving a rating to Assata’s story, because it’s American history, and how can we score that?

​Right away, this mysterious slow burn romance was off to an intriguing start. Olivia James’s grandmother Martha recently passed away, leaving Olivia her home. Her home was a cabin loaded with historical treasures, because Martha herself, was a historian and guardian of artifacts affiliated with and used for the Underground Railroad. The cabin, also deemed a historical site, on page one had become the scene of a robbery.
 
Olivia enters her grandmother’s home, noticing that the place had been ransacked. She calls the authorities, and to her surprise and perhaps initially her dismay as well, Cameron, her ex-boyfriend and park ranger shows up to investigate. Now I must admit, off rip, I was blaming everybody who entered the picture from Cameron to Ezra the art buyer, and Regina Olivia’s mentor. In some instances, I was dead on, but Ms. Howard kept me on my toes because I kept hitting brick walls.
 
The setting was so well-written and fleshed out that I could feel when the energy changed. Olivia’s inherited cabin, though it held a lot if history and was filled with the courageous spirits of those who were once enslaved, never once felt eerie. At first, I thought to myself “Could I have stayed in an old cabin in the woods?” The cabin was a second home to Olivia though and the place where her grandmother taught her a lot about their history as well as the town’s history. If I were her, then yes, I could’ve pulled it off too. From the opening of Chapter One, Ms. Howard pulls us into a rustic world that is more than aesthetically pleasing, with its heavy wood, colored fallen leaves, and older furnishings. All that was missing was a musical score.
 
I understood this to be a slow-burn romance, but Olivia and Cameron drove me absolutely insane. The deliberate miscommunication just proved how human beings are constantly getting in their own way when it comes to love. Olivia, being the main character was the most developed and she felt like a sister or close cousin that I occasionally wanted to shake. I liked Cameron’s attempt at being stoic until it became too much for me and I was talking back to him out loud as I read. I did flip through Ms. Howard’s other books to see if these two return though. I wouldn’t mind knowing what happens next with them.
 
The prominent theme to me aligned with something my grandfather said to me years ago. I was asking him questions about when he’d moved further up north in New York, and he said, “I thought I was running from my problems, but ya can’t run from ya problems. They will travel with you.” This novel is named History Lost Between Us, but nothing was ever lost. Olivia and Cameron thought they could run from and ignore their feelings for each other. They thought they could continue without closure, but their history lingered, forcing them into a situation together where they would have to face and solve their issues as a team. The importance of Black history woven throughout the novel reminds those who willingly forget how important Black people are to the structure as well as the breakthroughs of this country. There is no running away from the past, so we might as well embrace it.
I have already recommended this novel to fellow readers. It’s a dynamic blend of romance, desire, mystery, tension, and history. I enjoyed it from start to finish, and when I was done yelling at Olivia and Cameron, I was clapping for them. It is for sure a 4/5 star read, and should be considered for the big screen someday soon.

Before the BIBC began Master of Me by Keke Palmer, I’d recently had a change of heart about Ms. Palmer. For a while I felt like she was all over the place. I felt like every time I looked at social media, she was jumping around or involved in something. I remember one night coming across the film Pimp, and saying to myself “WHAT is this??” When she was younger, I was a fan. My daughter swore up and down she was Akeelah from Akeelah and the Bee. She would come up to me while I was cooking, tapping her leg and spelling words, saying “Mommy I’m just like Akeelah!” I thought Keke was an amazing role model in that film. From that point on, I kept an eye on her. Fast forward to Pimp—in my confusion, I still watched, and I was low-key, impressed. I felt she was true to the character, but naturally, as a Bronx girl, I was disappointed in the rest of the acting that didn’t feel true to The Bronx. It wasn’t a horrible film though. When she revealed her pregnancy on SNL, I said to myself “Okay now! She’s about to GROW up!” I watched her journey and clapped for her all the way through. The next thing I knew, I no longer felt like she was “all over the place.” I was proud of her. I compared her to Snoop Dog. I said, “Oh she hustlin’, getting a check everywhere she can and I can’t knock that.”

I’ve become really proud of Keke again, her books were on my TBR, and thankfully, the BIBC voted to read/listen to Master of Me.

Although I’d read the blurbs several times, I still couldn’t grasp the concepts of her books until I actually listened to them. I listened to Master of Me with the BIBC and then I Don’t Belong to You on my own. I found that they are both a combination of memoir and self-help. In Master of Me, I’ll be honest, I looked forward to the tea! I wanted to know about the baby-daddy’s crash out and how she let his behind go, and thrived. By the time I got to I Don’t Belong to You, I figured out her flow, and I was ready.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, in a cave, or both, you know Keke has a distinctive voice. The funny thing about distinctive celebrity voices is that just because we’re so familiar with them, we feel like we know these people. In Keke’s case, hearing her speech patterns and colloquialisms throughout her books make you feel like you’re just listening to one of your girls have an epiphany. I listen to audio books in the morning on the way to work, so it surely felt like a conversation I was having with one of my closest friends. I was initially worried that her with her voice being somewhat high pitched and nasal, that I might get agitated. But no… and maybe because, again, I listen to audiobooks on the way to work, so that’s only about 30-75 minutes of listening time per day. It was just the right dose Kee-keeing before work. (See what I did there?)

I appreciated how her anecdotes aligned well with her overall themes of how to find yourself, be yourself, and not lose yourself, but the stories also provided context for her public image. This is the real reason many of us read memoirs. We want to know the how and why behind the scenes. Without it being all tea, Keke taught, entertained, and inspired through her experiences.

I enjoyed Master of Me more than I Don’t Belong to you, honestly. Perhaps because Master of Me was a more seasoned Keke, with more life experience to share. I’m older than Keke, so a lot of what she had to say, I had already learned. Still it was refreshing to hear how someone in the industry amassed so much wisdom in such a busy life. Keke does what Keke wants, unapologetically, but also purposefully. I thought she was just jumping around on the internet and it turns out, it was a careful strategy to not only stay relevant, but to stay paid. Now look at her, she’s doing all the things and not bombing! I love it and I’m here for it.

The only things that got under my skin as I was listening, were some of the overused phrases. But that’s how it really is talking to friends, right? I have friends that repeatedly say “whole-heartedly” so much I wanna stop them and say, “is there anything you can speak on ‘half-heartedly?’ Do you really feel everything with your whole heart? No? Then for the love of my ears and brain, please find a new phrase.” The other thing is the Tyler Perry praise. *Sigh* Don’t get your bloomers and tight-whites in a bunch, TP fans—but we all know the man’s writing is tired. I absolutely applaud him for revolutionizing Black production with his company and studio, and he should definitely be receiving flowers for that. Truth be told, that’s what Keke gives him flowers for. She is inspired by his innovation and we all should be. We all talking about building our own tables, well TP provided one of the blueprints. It’s just that now, his writing is toxic and equally bland, so just hearing his name brings a sigh and an eye-roll. That’s just me… that ain’t Keke’s fault.

I rate I Don’t Belong to You 4/5 stars and Master of me 5/5 stars. They’re solid inspirational reads that feel more like chats before work with you closest homegirl(s). I especially think these reads are right for young creators. It’s easy to get caught up in what the world wants from you, especially when you’re young, but there is a way to stay relevant, loyal to fans, and still be you. Just listen to Keke.

All This Time is a spicy new adult, romance novel written by sizzling romance author J. Clark. The story is about two college kids, who’ve known each other since middle school, Michelle and Osirion. Their relationship has grown from a friendship, to mutual crushes, and finally to passionate lovers. The conflict here is that there are vast cultural differences between the two, and only one family is open to the cultural differences. Michelle is Black and comes from a strict Christian home. Her father is a pastor, running for public office. Osirion is Japanese and practices Shintoism, but his parents are pretty laid back.

The story takes place in present day Atlanta, predominantly on a college campus. The author drops reminders throughout, how hot and humid Atlanta can be. This contributes to the mood and tone of the story—heat is ever present, physically and emotionally.
 
The tale opens with Michelle and Osirion on the phone discussing a gift that he sent to her. From the gate, it is clear to readers that the lines of their relationship are blurred. They openly discuss being turned on and self-pleasuring, and directly on the heels of that one or both of them will say “we’re just friends.” Friendships between men and women exist where there is a hint of attraction and sometimes blatant attraction. I wonder, though, how often men and women are that open with each other, let alone with the same sex bestie, when it comes to deep sexual desires. As the story plays out, the big question is “will they ever be together?” I kept thinking, “why not?” Michelle seems to be holding on to what her father might think. On one hand she seems fearful, yet and still she has no problem talking dirty to her male “best friend.” She’s a walking contradiction, which made it somewhat hard for me to like her. Osirion was ready to go the entire time, even when he had a different girlfriend. There was never any question about where Osirion’s head was at in the game of love, and I think for that matter I enjoyed his character more.
 
There were a lot of unexpected interactions in this story. As aforementioned, Michelle and Osirion were heavy on the “best friends” narrative as a front, while consistently taking flirting to the next level. Aside from that, some of the conversations that adults and elders had with the young friends were odd an unexpected as well. For example, a particular character has a reputation for not only being well-endowed, but also having no skill or finesse with it, and everyone in the story talks about it, including church elders. An male relative of a victim of this character’s lack of delicacy, warns Michelle of possibly physically destroyed if she was to be intimate with this character. Though I sit and read on my couch, my breath was taken away with that scene. I couldn’t imagine one of my uncles discussing my sex life with a peer, but there are all different types of people in this world and nothing is impossible.
 
While I wasn’t crazy about Michelle’s character, I will say that the characters were very well-developed. Unlikeable, doesn’t mean unlayered, and just because I didn’t like Michelle doesn’t mean no one does (or will). Each character had a distinct personality, which is sometimes hard for authors to pull off because truth be told, there is always a piece of us in all of our characters. The only flaw within each character’s actions, was how everyone explicitly discussed sex, with everyone. No one had boundaries, and I found that a little unrealistic.

J. Clark’s approach to the spicy scenes deserves a round of applause. The scenes had intriguing yet imaginable flows. The language used to create the images was remarkable and spot on. Creating relatable mind-blowing sex scenes is not easy at all. Yet J. Clark made it look like a walk in the park.
 
J. Clark had a lot to share with readers in this story, and I hope I am at least close with the hidden messages I think I deciphered. The most important is that love is boundless. Michelle and Osirion were from vastly different cultures, and still they found love and passion with each other. I also think that J. Clark wanted readers to be comfortable with who they are and believe that if they want to, they can and will find a match. There is someone for everyone and sometimes we find our match in the least expected places. Finally, I also believe that J. Clark wants us to know that when we find that match, it is okay to let your “freak flag” fly, no matter what the colors on it are.
 
On Goodreads, I rated this novel 4/5 stars. I believe this is J. Clark’s second novel, and she did her thing with it. There’s an excerpt at the end of All This Time from an upcoming novel, so expect her to bring it on once again, and I look forward to it.