Third Place Books Seward Park is happy to announce the Black Lit Book Club, hosted by Shannon Hanks-Mackey, Seward Park bookseller and the managing editor of the Black Scholar journal. Gathering on the last Tuesday of each month, readers will explore the works of black authors from Africa and across the diaspora. This is a book club intended for black, indigenous, and other people of color (BIPOC).

Book club titles will not be limited to any one genre, and monthly picks may be pulled from fiction, history, mystery, graphica, sci-fi/fantasy, young adult, poetry, and more. The first discussion will be on Tuesday, January 29th, 2019 at 7 PM, and the first book is Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi (available now in hardcover and in paperback on December 18, 2018). February’s book is Heads of the Colored People: Stories by Nafissa Thompson-Spires (available now in hardcover and in paperback on January 22, 2019), and March’s book is The Changeling by Victor Lavalle. While the first three titles are preselected, attendees will be able to collectively choose future titles from a handful of available options. Recommendations will, of course, be welcome.

Future books may include, but are certainly not limited to, the following:

My Soul Looks Back: A Memoir by Jessica B. Harris
Mem by Bethany C. Morrow
This Mournable Body by Tsitsi Dangarembga
Bestiary: Poems by Donika Kelly
A Lucky Man: Stories by Jamel Brinkley
Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi
Meet Behind Mars by Renee Simms
Blackass by A. Igoni Barrett
Since I Laid My Burden Down Brontez Purnell
Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin by Terrance Hayes
Heavy: An American Memoir by Kiese Laymon
My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite
Work from authors such as Marlon James, Attica Locke, Nnedi Okorafor, Helen Oyeyemi, N.K. Jemisin, Phoebe Robinson, Elizabeth Acevedo, Morgan Parker, Taiye Selasi, Kevin Young, Vievee Francis, Michael Twitty, Yaa Gyasi, Tayari Jones, and more.

All monthly book club titles are discounted 20% for the month prior to the book club meeting. No purchase required. Drink specials (both alcoholic and non) are available from Raconteur during book club meetings.

The bookstore is on a street-level floor with wide aisles and no stairs to meeting area or to the wheelchair accessible restroom. There are two accessible parking spaces available near the front entrance (permit required). We ask that all attendees help make this a fragrance-free zone by not wearing scented products to the meeting.