We need to recognize the pleasure in Black literature now and in the future because recent events have shown that Black Lives Matter, not only Black Deaths – we are currently in the fourth week of international protests against anti-Black racism and police violence. The Black experience cannot be described by a single occurrence or time. It is harmful to one’s self-identity, mental health, and, ultimately, advancement and transformation. It is also not shared by every Black person on the planet. Exploring various tales, whether Afro-futurism, LGBTQ+, African, European, American, or Latin American in origin, provides relaxation, pleasure, and escape.
Why hadn’t you heard of The Nightmare-Verse or any of the other stories written by Black authors?
Because our novels do not focus on Black suffering, stories about police brutality, the struggle, poverty have been termed “problem” novels in the business, and it’s a well-kept secret that if your book doesn’t fit into this category, it won’t receive any significant push or promotion. These are the “correct” Black books that we mentioned previously.
Stopping and picking up a book is sometimes the most excellent approach to comprehending the world around us.
That is undeniably true in terms of race and power in America. Contemporary black authors have been producing various works changing our debates about the race for readers of all ages, whether via scholarly essays, riveting fiction, or poignant poems.
Some books address broader themes, such as mass imprisonment and police brutality. Others provide personal profiles of specific characters to depict the world through distinct eyes. However, regardless of the breadth, black writers utilize literature to analyze race and the impact of racism on the world around us.
Emunah La Paz
La-Paz, who was born in Montgomery, Alabama, in the 1970s, felt the pain of racism because of her varied family’s history of ingrained intolerance.
Attempting to shed the animosity associated with racial injustice became a way of life that evolved into many issues dealing with self-loathing and insecurity among men and women of all origins.
Chocolate Burnout: Part One, Emunah La-first Paz’s novel in a seven-part series, welcomes multi-cultural heritage and is listed in the Mavin foundation database of works by authors that discuss interracial relationships.
Memoir of a Jaded Woman: Tainted Love
Memoir of a Jaded Woman: Tainted Love was released in November 2016 by La-Paz.
In this book, La-Paz convened focus groups of women and investigated marriage and adultery with Bible study, spurred by a friend’s problematic wedding. One critic described the work as “a collection of angry, funny, and ultimately balanced opinions, including those of numerous males and their girlfriends” by one critic.
CHOCOLATE BURNOUT
An African American lady encounters difficulties in dating and friendship in La-story. Paz’s
Chantel Reed is a talented human resources worker in Seattle who struggles with interpersonal interactions. After the death of their friend Alison, she has drifted away from her friends Astrid and Serenity; her oldest sister, Daria, the family’s maternal figure, is prickly and controlling; and she finally breaks up with her slacker boyfriend, Cameron, after she discovers him cooking dinner for another woman in her apartment. Astrid and Serenity have opposing views on how Chantel should follow the split. When Brandon, a white guy, asks Chantel out, she is apprehensive since she has always dated black males.
La Paz’s Metaphors
La-ability Paz’s metaphor (“My novel have had prevented, so to speak, since I was too wrapped up inside of my own story, concentrating on my secret, addicting, prison of the mind”) makes this a fascinating read. La-Paz also performs a decent job of examining the difficulties of female friendships and multiracial relationships, albeit Chantel’s proclivity to misinterpret and make poor judgments makes her an inadequate vehicle for studying such problems because her relationships are broken. The reader may find the frequency of wrong conclusions tiresome as Chantel’s ability to act in her best interests deteriorates, but portions told from Astrid’s and Serenity’s perspectives welcome reprieve.
Conclusion
Surprisingly, some people believe that only white narratives can explore universality in literature. It’s possibly one of the unacknowledged reasons why it’s been so difficult for Black writers to get published in the United States. We’ve had several head-banging conversations along these lines with people who, in essence, see blackness as inferior to the supposed universality of whiteness and admire writers of color who create white-led narratives and are thus elevated above the rest. Of us who “can’t get beyond our race.”
