Black letters: Your complete guide to Atlanta’s Black literary scene

Atlanta’s Black creatives have always been a critical force in pushing the city’s consciousness around racial and social justice. Writers in particular — the vast and varied tradition of Black literary artists — have often been on the vanguard of challenging the political establishment and advancing an aesthetic vision. Through written word and courageous deeds, in the hands of the Atlanta Black writer, creative expression is a project of protecting democracy. By no means exhaustive, we highlight here some of the figures, events and institutions that contribute to the city’s vibrant literary scene today.

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Literary Events and Activities

• A Cappella Books hosts the Black-ish Book Club. The group meets to discuss fiction, nonfiction and poetry by Black writers and writers of color at the Dancing Goats Coffee Ponce City Market location on the last Sunday of each month.

• ArtsXchange hosts the Saturday Writers Workshop, an inclusive monthly gathering with host Theresa Davis that promises an inspiring journey into the art of writing. ArtsXchange also hosts a monthly open mic, which is open to art, poetry, comedy, storytelling, music and interpretive dance.

• The Auburn Avenue Research Library hosts programs with authors and events across a range of topics, such as 2024’s Collecting, Researching and Writing While Black Conference.

• Black Dot Cultural Center and Bookstore in Lithonia hosts book readings, book discussion groups and weekly open mic nights.

• Black Writers Weekend is an annual gathering of writers with a focus on literary and film creatives. This year’s event will take place in Atlanta July 31 through August 2.

• Charis Books & More has a notable history of hosting local and national Black writers, especially Black feminist writers, to spark critical dialogue in the Atlanta community. 

• Hush Harbor Lab is described as a “brave space for the development and production of new and innovative digital, live and multimedia performance work by Black Atlanta based artists.” It was founded by Addae Moon and Amina S. McIntyre, both Atlanta-based playwrights.

• The National Black Arts Festival organizes the Artist Project Fund for creatives who live in the metropolitan Atlanta area. The fund is open to literary artists.

• Poetry on Peter is a hub for Atlanta’s independent artists and hosts poetry and live music.

• Revival: Lost Southern Voices is an annual conference and festival that celebrates marginalized Southern literary forms and artists. This year’s event takes place March 20 through March 22.

• Urban Grind, a coffee shop on the west side, hosts open mic nights on Thursdays, including events presented by a rotation of guest hosts.

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Black Interest Book Stores

• 44th & 3rd Bookseller in the West End hosts a seemingly endless parade of author talks and author events with books in every imaginable category.

• Avant-garde Books in West End Mall focuses on strengthening literacy, hosting book clubs, book fairs and other events.

• Books & Brew in Tucker hosts game nights, crafts and specialty beers among its wide selection of multicultural books.

• Brave + Kind Bookshop in Decatur has a broad selection of books for children and adults, as well as copious book launch and story time events.

• For Keeps Books features rare and classic books in a truly alternative setting.

• Good Books is a web and pop-up book shop curating rare and vintage Black books and music.

• The Listening Tree celebrates Black authorship with a wide range of books for young readers, from picture books to journals, built on a membership model.

• Medu Bookstore in Greenbriar Mall recently celebrated 34 years in business.

• Nubian Books, a 25-year-old community institution, is Clayton County’s only remaining brick-and-mortar bookstore.

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Publications

• UATL, created by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, amplifies Atlanta Black culture. The platform has also featured information about books of interest to the Atlanta community.

• The Atlanta Voice, a historic Atlanta Black newspaper, has published interviews with authors and articles about literary events.

• The art gallery and arts organization Black Art in America publishes an eponymous print newspaper in addition to its other activities.

• Capital B has an Atlanta newsroom that amplifies Black voices and stories.

• The Reckoning is a publication that amplifies Black LGBTQIA+ stories and voices. (Disclosure: the author of this article is the publisher of The Reckoning.)

• Atlanta journalist Jewel Wicker has a substack that provides excellent cultural coverage.

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Writers

Atlanta Black literary artists are too numerous to list exhaustively. Here is a sampling of prominent writers and poets, plus a few underground favorites.

• Stacey Abrams has been celebrated for her historic leadership in politics, business and the nonprofit realm, but she’s also a prolific author. Her novels include Rogue Justice and While Justice Sleeps. Under the pen name Selena Montgomery, she has also written Power of Persuasion, Rules of Engagement and The Art of Desire. Her upcoming novel, a thriller titled Coded Justice, is part three of her Avery Keene series and will be released this summer.

• Daniel Black is a novelist, Clark Atlanta University professor and activist. His published works include the essay collection Black on Black: On Our Resilience and Brilliance in America and novels Perfect Peace and Don’t Cry for Me, among other works. His most recent novel, Isaac’s Song, is a novel about a young Black queer man finding his voice in the 1980s.

• Amena Brown Owen is a writer, poet and performing artist whose works have been featured on television and in New York Times best-selling books. She is the author of five spoken-word albums — including Advent Resounding, Breaking Old Rhythms and Live at Java Monkey — and two nonfiction books. She is currently the chapter host of CreativeMornings Atlanta.

• Jericho Brown is a poet and professor at Emory University. His body of work includes his collections The Tradition, New Testament and Please. Brown’s recognitions include the 2024 MacArthur Fellowship, the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the 2016 Guggenheim Fellowship, among others. Most recently, he edited the collection ​​The Selected Shepherd: Poems, consisting of works by the late poet Reginald Shepherd.

• Pearl Cleage is a playwright, essayist, novelist, poet and activist. She is currently the distinguished artist in residence at the Alliance Theatre. Her plays include Flyin’ West, Blues for an Alabama Sky and What I Learned in Paris, among others. In her play Something Moving: A Meditation on Maynard, she explores the election of Maynard Jackson, Atlanta’s first Black mayor.

• Jon Goode is an Emmy-nominated author, poet and playwright. His works include the poetry and story collection Conduit and a novel, Mydas. His most recent short story collection, Black Curio, is described as “a collection of short stories that live in the now, the not-so-distant past and the far-flung future of the Black experience.”

• Hugh “H.D.” Hunter is a storyteller, teacher and organizer. His works include: Futureland: The Architect Games; Futureland: The Nightmare Hour; Futureland: Battle for the Park; and Torment: A Novella. His most recent work, the young adult novel Something Like Right depicts a life-altering year in the life of a biracial teen boy. The novel grapples with race and systemic inequality.

• Kimberly Latrice Jones is a writer and filmmaker, whose young adult novel, I’m Not Dying With You Tonight, co-authored with Gilly Segal, was a New York Times bestseller. The novel follows one Black and one white teen girl as they rely on each other to get through a violent race riot, confronting their own racial beliefs in the process. Her other works include How We Can Win and Why We Fly (co-authored with Gilly Segal), among others. 

• Tayari Jones is a best-selling author and professor at Emory University. Her works include her brilliant debut, Leaving Atlanta; The Untelling; Silver Sparrow; and An American Marriage. She is a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, Lifetime Achievement Award in Fine Arts from the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, United States Artist Fellowship, NEA Fellowship and a Radcliffe Institute Bunting Fellowship.

• Ra’Niqua Lee is the author of the flash collection, For What Ails You, described as “a flash collection about Black femmes and new conjure women who take MARTA and battle a multiverse of woes, racism and generational trauma. They have the water, the juice and the juju, and they’re healing each other through the powers of food, prayer, sex and other un/known medicinals.” Some of Lee’s honors include the inaugural John Lewis Writing Grant for fiction from the Georgia Writers Association and a 2024 NEA fellowship. Lee’s novel is currently a finalist for the Townsend Prize.

• W. J. Lofton is a poet and multimodal artist. His works include A Garden for Black Boys Between the Stages of Soil and Stardust and the upcoming collection boy maybe: poems. Described as “verses that explore Black queer Southern identity, grief, love and intimacy while enduring and witnessing unfreedom in America,” it will be released in the spring.

• Alice Lovelace has been active in Atlanta’s arts and culture scene since 1976. A poet, performance artist, playwright, cultural worker and more, Lovelace founded The Arts Exchange (later called ArtsXchange) in 1984. Lovelace continues to write, convene artists and work toward social change through programs at ArtsXchange as Executive Director.

• Denechia “Neesha” Powell-Ingabire is a movement journalist, essayist and community and cultural organizer. Their debut memoir, Come By Here: A Memoir in Essays from Georgia’s Geechee Coast, is described by how it “chips away at coastal Georgia’s facade of beaches and golden marshes to recover undertold Black history alongside personal and family stories.”

• Kelundra Smith is an arts and culture journalist, playwright, theater critic and editor. Her play, The Wash, about a strike by a diverse group of washerwomen in Atlanta in the 19th century, is described as “an intimate and often funny look at ordinary women who went from workers to fighters — and won.” (Disclosure: Kelundra Smith is an ArtsATL editor-at-large.)

• Angie Thomas is an author whose best-selling debut novel, The Hate U Give, was adapted into a motion picture. Her other works include On the Come Up, Find Your Voice, Concrete Rose and Black Out. Her middle grade novel, Nic Blake and the Remarkables: The Manifestor Prophecy is described as “an inventive, hilarious and suspenseful new contemporary fantasy trilogy inspired by African American history and folklore.”

• Mia S. Willis is a poet, a popular educator and a cultural historian whose debut collection, the space between men, is described as “a poetic ethnography that creates and documents the vocabulary of the Southern Black queer experience.”

Also check out: Akeem Ali, Sean Fahie, Ashlee Haze, Doug Jones, Miyana Sarver, Queen Sheba and more!

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Charles Stephens is an Atlanta-based writer. His work has appeared in publications such as Atlanta magazine, Creative Loafing, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Georgia Voice, The Advocate and Them.

Cinqué Hicks contributed to this report.