The ReadDown

Works of Horror by African American Writers

Jordan Peele’s horror movies Get Out and Us have gotten great reviews from critics and fans alike. Not only is Peele creating films within an industry and genre where comparatively few horror films have been helmed by people of color, but he’s created films that are both thoughtful cultural commentaries and box office hits. Unfortunately, African American voices aren’t well represented in horror literature, either, and there are many great writers of color all horror fans need to read. Here’s a list of horror stories by African American writers to check out.

1

Fledgling

by Octavia E. Butler

The late Octavia Butler’s book Fledgling is the story of Shori Matthews: a being who appears to be a 10 year-old black girl, but is in fact a 53 year-old vampire. Shori awakens in a cave with little idea of who, or where, she is. Shori’s awakening attracts the attention of mysterious assassins, forcing her to try to unravel the mystery of her identity while on the run.

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2

Beloved

by Toni Morrison

Sethe was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not free. She has borne the unthinkable and not gone mad, yet she is still held captive by memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things happened. Meanwhile Sethe’s house has long been troubled by the angry, destructive ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose tombstone is engraved with a single word: Beloved. Sethe works at beating back the past, but it makes itself heard and felt incessantly in her memory and in the lives of those around her. When a mysterious teenage girl arrives, calling herself Beloved, Sethe’s terrible secret explodes into the present.

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3

Just Wanna Testify

by Pearl Cleage

Atlanta’s West End district has always been a haven and home to a coterie of unique characters—artists and thinkers, dreamers and doers. Anyone planning to sell drugs, vandalize, or rob a little old lady should think twice before hitting this part of town. And Blue Hamilton, West End’s unofficial mayor and longtime protector, will see to it that you do. Blue wears many hats here, including adored husband to Regina, dear nephew to Abbey, and doting father to Sweetie and another little one on the way.

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4

The Devil in Silver

by Victor LaValle

The Devil in Silver brilliantly brings together the compelling themes that spark all of Victor LaValle’s radiant fiction: faith, race, class, madness, and our relationship with the unseen and the uncanny. More than that, it’s a thrillingly suspenseful work of literary horror about friendship, love, and the courage to slay our own demons.

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5

White is for Witching

by Helen Oyeyemi

There’s something strange about the Silver family house in the closed-off town of Dover, England, which has been home to four generations of Silver women. The Silver women have always had a strong connection, and when Lily, Miranda’s mother, passes away suddenly while on a trip abroad, Miranda begins suffering strange ailments. When she brings a friend home, Dover’s hostility toward outsiders physically manifests within the four walls of the Silver house, and the lives of everyone inside are irrevocably changed. At once an unforgettable mystery and a meditation on race, nationality, and family legacies, White is for Witching is a boldly original and terrifying.

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6

We Cast a Shadow

by Maurice Carlos Ruffin

In this near-future Southern city plagued by fenced-in ghettos and police violence, more and more residents are turning to this experimental medical procedure. The narrator just wants the best for his son, Nigel, a biracial boy whose black birthmark is getting bigger by the day. The darker Nigel becomes, the more frightened his father feels. This electrifying, hallucinatory novel is at once a keen satire of surviving racism in America and a profoundly moving family story. We Cast a Shadow fearlessly shines a light on the violence we inherit, and on the desperate things we do for the ones we love.

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7

Who Fears Death

by Nnedi Okorafor

In a post-apocalyptic Africa, the world has changed in many ways; yet in one region genocide between tribes still bloodies the land. A woman gives birth to an angry baby girl with hair and skin the color of sand. It doesn’t take long for the girl to understand that she is physically and socially marked by the circumstances of her conception. She is Ewu—a child of rape who is expected to live a life of violence, a half-breed rejected by her community. But even as a child, she manifests the beginnings of a remarkable and unique magic. As she grows, so do her abilities, but she learns something terrifying: someone powerful is trying to kill her.

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