A month ago, I wrote a little bit about how I got back into reading books — non-academic, non-religious books — after what seems like a decade-long hiatus. After a conversation with friends, and having just put music journalism on hold, I felt inspired to pick back up the hobby I put down many years ago. I read Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and a spark was reignited; suddenly, I had this profound desire to read more.

Over the past month, that’s exactly what I’ve done.

I read 4 books between February 10th and March 10th: the aforementioned Things Fall Apart, Sula by Toni Morrison, My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite, and Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. As you can tell from the authors, my focus has primarily been works of fiction by African/Black authors. Each of these told a unique and overall enjoyable story, with Things Fall Apart and Americanah being my definitive favorites from this past month (Americanah might be one of my favorite books I’ve ever read).

I’ve already made a wishlist of books I eventually want to read. The ones I plan on reading next are Kindred by Octavia Butler (I’m about 50 pages in) and then checking out Tomi Adeyemi’s fantasy novel Children of Blood and Bone. I also plan on reading Morgan Parker and Upile Chisala’s latest poetry collections Magical Negro and A Fire Like You, respectively.