12 Books by Black Chicago Women 2025

blackgirlsreadchi Host

35 participants (39 books)

01 Jan 2025—31 Dec 2025

Overview

Join us for the 12 Books by Black Chicago Women Reading Challenge for 2025! 

Whether you participated in the inaugural challenge or are participating for the first time—welcome! This year, let’s continue to celebrate the depth, diversity, and dopeness of Chicago’s Black women writers. Read at least 12 books by Black women from Chicago. The books can be in any genre, on any topic, and from any time period. 

Follow along here and on our Instagram page @blackgirlsreadchi, and use the hashtags #12BooksByBlackChicagoWomen and #12BooksByBlackWomenChi to share your progress. 

If you need a few more suggestions to get you started, check out our book list on Bookshop.org.

Challenge Books

All books added
Speaking of Summer by Kalisha Buckhanon

Speaking of Summer

Kalisha Buckhanon

10 hours, 10 minutes • first pub 2019 (editions)

fiction contemporary mystery emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced
Remote Control by Nnedi Okorafor

Remote Control

Nnedi Okorafor

4 hours, 7 minutes • first pub 2021 (editions)

fiction science fiction adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced
Ironheart, Vol. 1: Those with Courage by Eve Ewing

Ironheart, Vol. 1: Those with Courage

Ironheart (2018) #1

Eve Ewing

136 pages • first pub 2019 (editions)

fiction comics young adult adventurous medium-paced
Broken Places by Tracy Clark

Broken Places

Cass Raines #1

Tracy Clark

12 hours, 58 minutes • first pub 2018 (editions) user-added

fiction crime mystery dark mysterious tense fast-paced
1919 by Eve L. Ewing

1919

Eve L. Ewing

1 hour, 5 minutes • first pub 2019 (editions)

nonfiction history poetry race emotional informative reflective fast-paced
Threads: A Tapestry of Life in the Black Community of Shiloh and Beyond by Tanya Davis
Threads: A Tapestry of Life in the Black Community of Shiloh and Beyond
—
Tanya Davis

Threads: A Tapestry of Life in the Black Community of Shiloh and Beyond

Tanya Davis

192 pages • missing pub info (editions)

Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe

Last Summer on State Street

Toya Wolfe

224 pages • first pub 2022 (editions)

fiction contemporary emotional reflective sad medium-paced
From #BlackLivesMatter To Black Liberation by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

From #BlackLivesMatter To Black Liberation

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

10 hours, 45 minutes • first pub 2016 (editions)

nonfiction history politics race informative reflective medium-paced
The Mayor of Maxwell Street by Avery Cunningham

The Mayor of Maxwell Street

Avery Cunningham

508 pages • first pub 2024 (editions)

fiction historical emotional reflective slow-paced
Hide by Tracy Clark

Hide

Detective Harriet Foster #1

Tracy Clark

380 pages • first pub 2023 (editions)

fiction crime mystery thriller dark mysterious tense medium-paced