Happy Black History Month: All of my 5 star reads from Black authors for the past 5 years

Written By Willo Radgens
Illustration of a border with red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with white hand lettering that reads, “Every 5 star read I’ve read by a Black author in the past 5 years”

Illustration of a border with red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with white hand lettering that reads, “Every 5 star read I’ve read by a Black author in the past 5 years”

Illustration of a border with red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with white hand lettering and a thread

Illustration of a border with red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with white hand lettering that reads, “Inspired by this post…” and a thread from @_;;litandlattes that reads, “CONTROVERSIAL FEBRUARY BOOK PSA: please do not ask your black & brown bookworm friends to do the work of finding diversified book lists for you in this year 2026 of the internet. It is NOT OUR JOB to do the work of finding books by non-white authors that you may or may not read beyond February. We have done enough. Thank you in advance.”

I read a thread that said that Black people aren’t responsible for giving white folks reading recommendations for Black History Month. In honor of that, I’ve put together almost all of my five star reads of the past 5 years by Black authors.

Fiction

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers listed above.

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers listed above.

Nonfiction

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers nonfiction books by Black authors

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers nonfiction books by Black authors listed above

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers nonfiction books by Black authors

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers nonfiction books by Black authors listed above

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers nonfiction books by Black authors

Illustration of red, yellow, and green lines on a black background with pictures of book covers nonfiction books by Black authors listed above

Have and loved any of these? Are any going on your TBR? I’d love to hear from you or connect with you on StoryGraph.

Happy reading!

Willo Radgens
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A New Look for an Old Thing