Literature

The month of February has whipped by so fast that you almost missed it.  It's true that the month is short, as compared to the other months, but no worries. There's still a lot remaining, surely enough left to catch...
A popular Memphis figure in children’s motivational workshops has dropped a colorful and creative book with an important message: “Don’t Touch A Gun.” Ekpe Abioto, a self-styled “musical philanthropist” has been drumming and chanting positive messages to children for nearly...
“Overcoming: How Faith, Family, and Friends Helped One Black Man Beat the Odds,” chronicles the life journey of Dr. Willie Dean.  Those bedrocks helped Dean rise from a poor, African-American child born to sharecropper parents, to becoming the first president...
Anthony Ray Hinton knows of a story so disturbingly real that it drives him to ask strangers to help him end the use of the death penalty in the U.S. The story is Hinton’s story, including the emotion-triggering account of...
by Angela Johnson -- This September 18-24 is Banned Books Week, an annual celebration of the freedom to read, which began in 1982. Across the country, there have been continuous efforts to ban books from libraries and schools that deal with issues...
One hundred sixty-three. That’s how many friends you have on social media and you know most of them, one way or another. There are colleagues on your list, and cousins, friends, and a guy you don’t really remember meeting. You...
In “Black Skin” by Dija Ayodele, you’ll see how you can best care for your skin. Short shorts, tank tops, bare shoulders, barely-there sleeves. You want to wear them all this summer, and you want to look good doing it....
After school and Saturday mornings were devoted to fighting crime. There you were, seven, eight, nine years old, hard-bodied, brave, and fireproof – at least, in your mind. Along with your ancestors and others with superpowers, you were invincible. And...
You weren’t born knowing everything. People had to tell you what you needed to know, and that’s how you learn. You can guess sometimes, or figure other things out on your own but mostly, you’ve been told and then you...
New literary author Kelis Rowe fondly recalls the days as a young girl walking to Crystal Palace, the once-popular Whitehaven-area skating rink that closed in 2017.  That same roller rink would serve as the backdrop of her debut novel, “Finding...