About this Event
Black futurist literary lieux compels us to engage in generative dialogue and reflection about the substance of our living as Black folks – to dream our futures, in light of the complexities of our pasts and present. We highlight and even venerate the ancestral, as we grieve the layers of suffering that have been inflicted – the dystopias of Diaspora dealings – and imagine futures unfettered. We consider the possibilities, implications and ethical considerations of modern technologies and trends in design. Literally, and literarily, what do our (liberated) Black futures comprise?
Each month we will devote our attention to a selected title from within these vast categories, centring the works of foundational authors such as Octavia E. Butler and Samuel Delany, alongside contemporary writers including Rivers Solomon, N.K. Jemisin, Tomi Adeyemi and others.
Black Futures book club will meet virtually in July, November, and December.
Current Book List (2026)
June 22: Positive Obsession – Octavia E. Butler Biography by Susana M. Morris
July 27 (Virtual): Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon
(NEW DATE) August 24: You Should Have Been Nicer to My Mom by Vincent Tirado
September 28: As the Earth Dreams: A Black Canadian Speculative Story
October 26: The Black Girl Survives this One – Anthology
November 23 (Virtual): Son of the Morning by Akwaeke Emezi
December 28 (Virtual): Ring Shout by P.Djeli Clark
Previously Read:
January: We Are the Crisis by Cadwell Turnbull
February: We Will Rise Again edited by Karen Lord, Annalee Newitz, and Malka Older
March 23: When the Reckoning Comes by LaTanya McQueen
April 27: The Abbott – graphic novel series by Saladin Ahmed
May 18: Love After the End: An Anthology of Two-Spirit Indigoqueer Speculative Fiction
June 22: Positive Obsession – Octavia E. Butler Biography by Susana M. Morris
Event venue & nearby stays
Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute, 104 17th Avenue South, Seattle, United States
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups — all the happenings, one place.