Writers of Color 50 Books Challenge

Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko
A classic novel for a reason. A Laguna Pueblo man comes back from WWII with PTSD and works through healing himself and his community as he realizes how far back through colonialism the problems go and how far back he has to go to find a solution. Which is a terrible summary that makes the conclusions sound so pat and perfect, whereas this is a book comfortable with messiness, comfortable with hard answers and the possibility that things won't work out. It's not a hopeless book: it knows that something will come and it might be better, but it also knows there aren't simple answers to these problems. It's very good, though obvious content warnings for PTSD, violence, etc.

Dreaming and Scheming: Reflections on Writing and Politics by Hanif Kureishi
Some of this is essays written on British politics during the eighties, and some of this is notes on the author's experience writing his films. I found the first half more interesting, but I have to admit that I haven't seen any of the films or plays and I might feel differently if I had. There's an immediacy to his impressions of political events that makes them compelling even when his concerns for the future have already played themselves out, and a perspective not seen often enough.

BlackLife: Post-BLM and the Struggle for Freedom by Rinaldo Walcott and Idil Abdillahi
This short book discusses Black Lives Matter as it happened in Canada and the reasons why it's still relevant in a country that likes to compare itself to the US and assume that we're doing fine because we're marginally better than them in certain ways. Unsurprisingly, there are plenty of them. A useful book.

Diamond Mountains: Travel and Nostalgia in Korean Art by Soyoung Lee, with Ahn Daehoe, Chin-Sung Chang and Lee Soomi
Essays on various paintings of the Diamond Mountains that are in what is now North Korea, but were once a place of pilgrimage for people from across the Korean Peninsula and, in the 19th century, around the world for their great natural beauty. Lots of gorgeous plates of paintings, and it was very interesting to see all the different artists paint the same places in different views, as well as read about how these different views affected people's ideas of a place that, after all, most people would never see.