BIPOC Adaptation news has been all over the place. One the one hand, we got a date for the third Black Panther movie, and an announcement on Colson Whitehead’s Harlem trilogy is coming to TV. There was also the trailer for Children of Blood and Bone, which racked up 16 million views in only three days. On the other hand, there is some drama going on with Children of Blood and Bone, they canceled Blade—even after Mahershala Ali trained for over a year for it (how you fumble a Mahershala Ali Blade is beyond me)—and Wonder Man, starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II has been canceled, and that’s after it was first renewed. There’s something funky going on when it comes to adaptations centering BIPOC characters, and it seems to be totally disregarding what the public actually wants.
With that said, there are at least some great BIPOC books out this month. Below is just a sample, but they include a long lost memoir by a Hiroshima survivor, a nuanced look at female friendship, Claudia Rankine’s latest genre-defying work, and more.
Hiroshima, 8:15: The Lost Memoir by Kiyoshi Tanimoto, Translated by Koko Tanimoto Kondo
On August 6, 1945, at 8:15 in the morning, tens of thousands of people in Hiroshima were killed and countless were injured in an atomic blast. Kiyoshi Tanimoto was on the edge of the city when he saw the blast and ran to the city center to find his family. In this newly discovered memoir, Tanimoto gives a first-hand account of the horrors he saw and the region’s long road to recovery. —Kendra Winchester
Murder at the End of the World by Akane Araki,
Translated by Jesse Kirkwood
For fans of detective duos, Japanese murder mysteries, and “an asteroid is about to hit the earth” setting
If there are only two months left to live—an asteroid is about to hit the earth—what’s the point of solving a murder? Turns out some people are trying to go about their lives as usual until they figure out what to do. Enter Haru, a university student getting her driver’s license, and Isagawa, her instructor/former police detective. When they find someone stabbed to death, they decide to investigate since the police most likely won’t. —Jamie Canaves
In Reading Color
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Take What You Can by Naima Coster
From the author of What’s Mine and Yours comes this complex look at female friendship through different life stages. When Val and Milly become best friends, it was as the only Black kids in their study abroad group in France. Now that they’re in their 30s, each with their own partner and a baby on the way, they’re thinking of raising their kids together. But it’s been nearly 10 years since they had their rift and drifted a part; and each of them secretly thinks about how strong their relationshp is without the older woman mentor they had in France. I am always done for a novel on female friendship, especially one that dips its toes into class and new motherhood. —Erica Ezeifedi
Triage by Claudia Rankine
Is this one nonfiction? Is it fiction? Um…yes! Rankine is known for bending genre to her will: her poetry collection Citizen: An American Lyric used photographs, analysis, and quotations to meditate on race, stress, and prejudice. Now, in Triage, Rankine presents a sort of memoir, as two characters, the narrator and theorist, bounce off each other and try to find their place both in their relationship (described as sisters) and in the world. The book promises to be a trip, a text accompanied by full-color illustrations, a book about violence past and present, and what it means to forge a kinship. —Leah Rachel von Essen
The Inevitable Undoing of Zahara Douglass by Leslye Penelope
This thrilling fantasy takes readers all the way back to just before Y2K in 1999, when the world wondered if the changing of the calendar would cause the computers to crash. Zahara is a young woman navigating the anticipation as she searches for her missing twin sister…who only she believes ever existed. —Liberty Hardy
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