The Marrow of Tradition, Charles Chestnutt. 1901.

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Set in the fictitious town of Wellington, this novel is a fictional account of the 1898 Wilmington Insurrection. It chronicles the rise of white supremacist movements in North Carolina and details the race riots, coup d’etat or massacre that led to the only successful overthrow (so far) of a legitimately elected government in American history.

Of One Blood: Or, The Hidden Self, Pauline Hopkins. The Colored Co-operative Publishing Company, 1902.

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Serialised in The Colored American Magazine from November 1902 to November 1903, Pauline Hopkins’s Of One Blood follows a mixed-race American named Ruel as he travels from America to Nubia in search of the treasures of Meroe. The novel explores themes of love and trauma, race and heritage, and culture and memory through the perspective of African Americans.

Uncle Tom’s Children, Richard Wright. Penguin Books. 1938.

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Uncle Tom’s Children is the first book published by Richard Wright, whose later works include Native Son (1940) and The Outsider (1953). The title references the earlier anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852), and the book comprises several novellas relating to Black experiences within America particularly with racial violence, segregationist policies and white supremacist mobs.

The Street. Anne Petrym. Virago Modern Classics. 1946.

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Set in Harlem during the Second World War, this novel follows the story of Lutie Johnson, a Black single mother, detailing her experiences with racism, sexism and classism. The Street was incredibly popular when it was first published, and it was the first novel by an African American woman to sell over a million copies.

Invisible Man, Ralph Waldo Ellison. Penguin Books. 1952.

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Ralph Ellison became the first African American author to win the US National Book Award for Fiction when his debut novel, Invisible Man, won the award in 1953. The story is told by an unnamed Black narrator, who reflects on the ways that he has experienced social invisibility throughout his life. He chronicles what it was like to study at an all-Black university after winning a scholarship to attend following a humiliating competition in front of the white luminaries of his small southern town. He also charts the impact of poverty and illness on himself and Black communities, and, in Harlem, New York he narrates his experience with the Black nationalist group known as "the Brotherhood."

Go Tell It on the Mountain, James Baldwin. Penguin Books. 1953.

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This semi-autobiographical novel tells the story of the fictional John Grimes as he grows up in 1930s Harlem. It explores his relationship with his family–particularly his mother, biological father and militantly religious stepfather–as well as the dual role of the Pentecostal Church in Black communities as both a source of comfort and inspiration but also of moral hypocrisy.

In the Castle of My Skin, George Lamming. Penguin Books. 1953.

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Set in a fishing village in 1930’s Barbados, In the Castle of My Skin is George Lamming’s debut novel. It is an autobiographical coming-of-age story that focuses on nine-year-old G. as his quiet childhood is disrupted by the reality of life under colonial rule and as he starts to understand the violence and injustice that emerges from colonialism. The novel won a Somerset Maugham Award, and in 1954 Lamming published a sequel, The Emigrants, that continues to follow G.’s story as he travels from Barbados to England.

The Emigrants, George Lamming. 1954.

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Written by Barbadian writer George Lamming, The Emigrants tells the story of an immigrant's journey as he travels to Britain from Barbados, focusing on the initial journey by sea, the settling in process and the discovery of new communities and new identities. It explores the impact of colonialism in creating alienation, hostility and strangeness for Black British communities with their roots in various parts of the British Empire.

My Bones and My Flute: A Ghost Story in the Old-Fashioned Manner, Edgar Mittelholzer. Peepal Tree Press Ltd. 1955.

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Set in the British colony of British Guiana in 1933, and written by Guyanese author Edgar Mittelholzer, My Bones and My Flute tells the story of a haunting arising from the 1763 slave revolt. The novel’s ghost is a jumbee–a ghost from Caribbean folklore typically considered to be a malevolent entity–of a Dutch slaveowner whose family were killed in the slave revolt, and who subsequently committed suicide, and now his spirit haunts those who come into contact with his written will.

The Lonely Londoners, Sam Selvon. Penguin. 1956.

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The Lonely Londoner is the story of immigrant experience within London. Written by Trinidadian author Samuel Selvon, the novel explores the experiences of poor, working class immigrants from the West Indies in post-World War 2 Britain. It follows various characters from the “Windrush generation”, but mainly focuses on Moses Aloetta, a homesick émigré from Trinidad.

To Sir, With Love, E. R. Braithwaite. 1959.

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The autobiographical novel To Sir, With Love explores E. R. Braithwaite’s experience as a Black engineer moving from British Guiana to post-war Britain. After serving the RAF during the Second World War, the novel’s protagonist Ricky Braithwaite finds he is unable to find work despite his qualifications because he is Black. Eventually, Ricky accepts a teaching post at a secondary school in London’s East End. In 1967, To Sir, With Love was adapted into a film of the same name, and the novel has since been adapted into dramatisations for radio and theatre.

The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison. Penguin Books. 1970.

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Toni Morrison’s debut novel, The Bluest Eye, chronicles the story of Pecola, a young Black girl growing up during America’s Great Depression. Due to her dark skin and mannerisms, she is considered to be ugly, particularly in comparison to the prevalence of white beauty standards across the media and white baby doll toys, which leads her to develop an inferiority complex. She desires blue eyes because she associates blue eyes with whiteness and beauty. Since its publication, there have been many attempts to ban the novel from American schools and libraries and according to the American Library Association it is one of most challenged books in the United States.

Natives of My Person, George Lamming. Allison & Busby. 1972.

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Written by Caribbean author George Lamming, Natives of Mr Person explores slavery and colonialism. Set in the fictional kingdoms of Lime Stone and Antarctica–which are based in part on England and Spain which battled for colonial domination over the West Indies–the story follows an illegal voyage to Lime Stone, and through diary entries and the ship’s log as well as the omniscient narrator exposes the destructive and racist nature of colonialism.

Roots: The Saga of an American Family, Alex Haley. Vintage. 1976.

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Roots transports its reader from 18th-century West-Africa to North America as it chronicles the story of Kunta Kinte, a young Mandinka boy captured and sold into slavery, and then the life of his descendants as they search for their genealogical and historical roots. The novel was immediately successful, and was quickly adapted into two television miniseries: Roots (1977) and Roots: The Next Generations (1979).

Kindred, Octavia E. Butler. Beacon Press. 1979.

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Kindred merges slave narratives and time travel as it follows African American writer, Dana, as she is transported geographically and temporally between her contemporary Los Angeles home in 1976 and a Maryland plantation in the 19th century. While Dana and her white husband try to deal with the continuing impact and legacy of slavery (and time travel) in the present, in the past Dana meets her ancestors and experiences the violent realities of life as an enslaved woman first-hand. Recently, the story was adapted into a graphic novel by Duffy Damian and John Jennings.

Linden Hills. Gloria Naylor. 1985.

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Gloria Naylor uses Dante's Inferno as an allegorical model for the racial and class realities of the exclusive neighbourhood of Linden Hill, its affluent Black residents as well as individuals trying to find work in the various social circles of this American Dream-turned nightmare.

Beloved, Toni Morrison. Vintage Classics. 1987.

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Beloved tells the violent story of Sethe, a formerly enslaved woman, and her family as they are haunted by an individual (perhaps a ghost) who calls herself Beloved. Reading an 1856 newspaper article “A Visit to the Slave Mother who Killed Her Child” which recounts the story of Margaret Garner–an enslaved woman who escaped a Kentucky plantation and fled to the free state of Ohio–Toni Morrison was inspired to write her novel, and there are many similarities between her character Sethe and Margaret Garner. In 1998, the novel was adapted into a film of the same name and starring Oprah Winfrey. Beloved has also been the subject of many attempts (some successful) to ban the novel being taught in schools, and even inspired the “Beloved Bill” in Virginia which centred on giving parents control over school curriculum.

Myal, Erna Brodber. Beacon Books. 1988.

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Myal, written by Jamaican-born author Erna Brodber, tells the story of a woman’s cultural and spiritual struggle in colonial Jamaica. Set in the 20th century and focusing on Ella, a light-skinned woman who married a white American man, it explores the Afro-Jamaican religion, myal, and the theft and appropriation of the cultures of colonised people. The novel was awarded the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Canada and the Caribbean.

Small Island, Andrea Leavy. London: Headline Review. 2004.

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Set primarily in 1948, Small Island focuses on the post-war diaspora of Jamaican immigrants in Britain. The novel follows four main characters, including several veterans of the British army who had fought in the Second World War, as they navigate moving to the “Mother Country” and experience unexpected difficulties and racism. William “Billy” Strachan, a Black Civil Rights Leader, inspired several of the characters. In 2009, the novel was adapted into a two-part BBC television drama of the same name.

On Beauty, Zadie Smith. Penguin. 2005.

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Zadie Smith has described her novel, On Beauty, as an “homage” to E. M. Forster’s Howards End, and both novels focus on the interactions and interweaving of two families who appear to have different values and beliefs. The families in Smith’s novel are the Belsey family–consisting of white university professor Howard, his African American wife Kiki, and their three children–and the Kipps family–consisting of Trinidadian Monty, his wife Carlene, and their two children. When Monty begins work at Howard’s university, the two men become rivals and the narrative explores liberalism, religion, class and affirmative action alongside inter-personal and familial relationships.

White Is For Witching, Helen Oyeyemi. Pan Macmillan. 2009.

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White is For Witching is an unconventional haunted house novel. Merging aspects of ghost, vampire and haunted house tales with a complex narrative style that shifts between first-person and third-person narration, the novel is told through the perspectives of Miranda Silver and Eliot Silver (who are twins), Ore Lind (the daughter of Nigerian immigrants who is adopted by white parents and who becomes one of Miranda’s love interests), and The Silver House (in other words, the house itself). British identity and whiteness are key to the novel’s horror and its haunting.

The Inheritance trilogy (The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms [2010]; The Broken Kingdoms [2010]; The Kingdom of Gods [2011]), N. K. Jemisin. Orbit ltd. 2010-2011.

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The Inheritance trilogy, which includes N. K. Jemisin’s debut novel The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, is a fantasy series that begins with a three-way power struggle in the floating city of Sky.

Boy, Snow, Bird, Helen Oyeyemi. Pan Macmillan. 2013.

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The fairytale of Snow White–of which Boy, Snow, Bird is in part a reworking of–and Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel Passing were the inspiration for Helen Oyeyemi’s fifth novel. This novel narrates the story of Bird, a Black girl born to Boy, a young white girl, and Arturo, who reveals after Bird’s birth that his parents were white-passing African Americans from Louisiana. Bird is abandoned by her jealous mother because she is Black and cannot pass as white, and instead she is raised by Arturo’s older sister.

The Ballad of Black Tom, Victor LaValle. Tor., 2016.

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The Ballad of Black Tom revisits and reworks H. P. Lovecraft’s racist short story “The Horror at Red Hook” from the perspective of a Black man. The novel begins with Charles Thomas “Tommy” Tester, a Black man living in New York earning his living through busking and hustling. He is asked to deliver an occult book to an individual in Queens, but before doing so he tears out the final few pages. Having delivered (mostly) the book, Tommy then meets a wealthy man named Robert Suydam, Inspector Malone and a private detective, Mr. Howard, before eventually encountering ancient horrors and Cthulhu. Ultimately, Tommy (now going by the name of Black Tom) decides that he prefers cosmic horrors to real-world racism.

My Name Is Leon, Kit de Waal. Penguin Books. 2016.

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Told through the perspective of nine-year-old Leon, Kit de Waal’s debut novel is set in 1980s Birmingham and it follows brothers Leon and Jake as they are placed into foster care. The narrative takes place against the backdrop of 1981 Handsworth riots which, like other riots that erupted across Britain in the summer of 1981, involved clashes between Black British youths and the police. As Leon tries to keep his family together, he has to contend with his brother’s white identity, his own mixed race identity, and what that means within the context of Britain’s foster care and adoption system.

The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead. Penguin Random House. 2016.

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Set in 19th-century Antebellum South, Colson Whitehead’s novel tells a story of alternate history in which Cora, a slave trying to escape from a Georgia plantation, makes her bid for freedom by following the Underground Railroad. In history, the Underground Railroad refers to an organised network of safe houses and secret routes across Northern America that were used by fugitive enslaved people. In Whitehead’s novel, these routes form an actual railway, and Cora manages to escape by travelling on a train to North Carolina, but soon discovers more horrors in the form of slave-catchers who return runaway slaves to their former captors, experimental medical trials performed on Black men, and violent mob executions. In 2021, Amazon released a miniseries of the same name adapted from The Underground Railroad.

The Confessions of Frannie Langton, Sara Collins. Penguin Books. 2019.

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Taking place in 1826, the narrative of The Confessions of Frannie Langton is set in the dual locations of a Jamaican sugar plantation and the Old Bailey criminal court in Georgian London. This Gothic historical thriller focuses on Frannie Langton, an enslaved woman who moves from Jamaica to become a maid to Mr. and Mrs. Benham in their London house. Now, however, Frannie is standing trial accused of their murder.

Girl, Woman, Other, Bernardine Evaristo. Penguin Books. 2019.

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Girl, Woman, Other tells the intertwined stories of 12 Black British women. It explores the intersection of race, gender, sexuality, age and economic status through the lives of these characters from birth to old age, and the ways that different women experience otherness. Speaking about her motivation for writing the novel, Bernadine Everisto has said that she wanted to address a lack of visibility of Black British women within literature, and to “put presence into absence”.

The Water Dancer, Ta-Nehisi Coates. Penguin Books. 2019.

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Set in the pre-Civil War South, Ta-Nehisi Coates’s debut novel tells the story of Hiram Walker, an enslaved man born into slavery on a Virginia tobacco plantation. Hiram is the son of a Black enslaved woman and a white plantation owner who sold Hiram when he was young. However, Hiram is not an ordinary slave: he possesses an extraordinary photographic memory and also a superhuman ability known as “conduction”. This ability is powered by his memory and storytelling, particularly of his mother, and with it he can transport himself and other people across long distances.

The Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead. Little, Brown Book Group. 2019.

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The Nickel Boys explores the historic Dozier School through a fictionalised version of the school, the Nickel Academy, focusing on the abuse that took place at this reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida. The narrative alternates between the 1960s and the 2010s, telling the stories of African American boys as they experienced abuse at the Nickel Academy and also the later investigation of the now defunct school that uncovers dead bodies secretly buried on the school’s premises as well as the lasting traumatic impact of the abuse upon now adult men. The novel was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2020, and in 2024 was adapted into a film of the same name.

The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney, Okechukwu Nzelu. Dialogue. 2019.

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Okechukwu Nzelu’s debut novel focuses on Nnenna Maloney, a half-Nigerian teenager growing up in Manchester, as she starts to search out connections with her Igbo-Nigerian culture. As Nnenna asks her white mother for information about her Nigerian father, their relationship becomes strained because her mother refuses to discuss him. The novel explores questions of identity and belonging within this context of race and family.

Queenie, Candace Carty-Williams. Trapeze. 2019.

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Initially marketed as a “Black Bridget Jones”, Candace Carty-Williams’s debut novel tells the story of Queenie Jenkins, a Black 25-year-old British Jamaican woman. It follows the ups and downs of Black womanhood but also Black British life. In 2004, Channel 4 adapted the novel into a television series of the same name.

Such a Fun Age, Kiley Reid. Bloomsbury. 2019.

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Such a Fun Age explores experiences of privilege, class, interracial relations and racism in Philadelphia. It focuses on 25-year-old African American woman, Emira Tucker, who is hired as a babysitter for a wealthy white couple, Alix and Peter Chamberlain. Alix is an influencer, and her husband is a television anchor, and Emira faces suspicion and racism as people question whether she is legitimately their babysitter, and even accuse her of kidnapping the white children in her care.

Ring Shout, P. Djèlí Clark. St Martin's Press. 2020.

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Ring Shout, or Ring Shout, or, Hunting Ku Kluxes in the End Times, is a dark historical southern Gothic novella that follows the story of Maryse Boudreaux as she hunts "Ku Kluxes", which are demons summoned by the Ku Klux Klan. Set in the alternate history of 1920s Georgia, the novel reimagines the release of The Birth of a Nation in 1915 as a magical event in which dark magic bewitches people to believe that African Americans are evil while the KKK are saviours who will rescue America from this imagined malevolence. Ex slave narratives, the West African tradition of Ring Shout and Gullah culture all served as inspiration for P. Djeli Clark when writing his novel.

The Vanishing Half, Brit Bennett. Dialogue. 2020.

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Set in the fictional Louisiana town of Mallard, a town established by a former enslaved man only for light-skinned people, The Vanishing Half is an historical novel that explores racism, colourism and racial passing through an intergenerational family saga. The narrative spans from the 1940s to the 1990s and follows identical twin sisters Desiree and Estelle "Stella" Vignes, and their daughters as they contend with their own identities, and their differing experiences within their family and with the wider society.

The Trees, Percival Everett. Pan Macmillan. 2021.

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The Trees is a murder mystery set in a small Mississippi town, and author Percival Everett drew on the history of lynching in the United States along with the violent murder of Emmett Till to construct his narrative. The novel centres on a series of murders that follow an identical pattern: two individuals are always discovered murdered, a white man and an unidentified Black man, but when the bodies are taken to the morgue the body of the Black man mysteriously disappears. Eventually, two Black detectives discover that there may be a connection between the murdered white men and Carolyn Bryant, a white woman whose accusations against Emmett Till of sexual assault led to his lynching.

Jackal, Erin E. Adams. Random House Inc. 2022.

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Jackal is the debut novel of Erin E. Adams, a first-generation Haitian American writer and theatre artist. Set in the predominantly white town of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, this horror novel follows Liz Rocher, a Black woman as she returns to the town she once called home for her best friend’s wedding. However, on the night of the wedding a Black girl goes missing and Liz turns detective as she notices a pattern of Black girls going missing and uncovers the horrifying secrets of this town. Jackal was named one Cosmopolitan’s best horror novels of all time, and it was also named best novel of the year by Esquire, Vulture, PopSugar, Paste, and Publishers Weekly.

The Fraud, Zadie Smith. Penguin Books. 2023.

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Set in 19th century Britain, The Fraud is an historical novel that focuses on the celebrated criminal trial of a man claiming to be Roger Tichborne, the missing heir to the Tichborne baronetcy and fortune. Roger Tichborne is presumed to have died in a shipwreck, but when an individual turns up claiming to be the missing heir, all of Britain is gripped by the ensuing trial. A star witness to the trial is Andrew Bogle, who grew up as an enslaved man on a Jamaican sugar plantation.

The Reformatory, Tananarive Due. Titan Books. 2023.

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Like The Nickel Boys, Tananarive Due’s The Reformatory is also based on the Dozier School in Florida and explores the abuse and atrocities committed there. Due’s novel merges elements of horror with historical fiction, focusing on twelve-year-old Robert Stephens Jr. Like many other children in Gracetown, Florida, Robert can see “haints” or ghost/spirits of the dead. When Robert is sentenced to six-months at the Gracetown School for Boys (a fictionalised version of the Dozier School), his ability to see “haints” soon comes in useful for the abusive warden, Haddock, who wants Robert to trap them. The ghosts, however, have other ideas and want Haddock to pay for his history of abuse.

Until Proven Innocent, Nicola Williams. Penguin Books. 2023.

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Until Proven Innocent explores the intersection of racism with law enforcement in Britain. At the centre of the novel is the murder of a young teenage boy, the son of a Black pastor, in London, and the ensuing murder trial. Sergeant Jack Lambert, a police officer well-known for his racism, is charged with the murder, but as he professes his innocence it falls to Lee Mitchell, a young barrister with a working class Caribbean background, to defend him in court.

See also:

Black Britain: Writing Back series. Penguin. 2021-2023.