Sistah Vegan Featured Author: Freedom Speaks Diaspora

Black female vegan and author, Freedom Speaks Diaspora, published an incredibly enjoyable novel in 2008 called Manjani

I was personally asked to review it this past Spring.

The book is about Manjani, a loud mouth black teen who feels the her black peers do not know what true black liberation is. She also has “issues” with white people . The novel is set in the 1990s.

This book is very enjoyable and difficult to put down. I cracked up during one scene when Manjani straight forwardly asks white characters, “Tell me about White Power.” I lost it when her new found friend Hollis did something very funny during her father’s poetry reading (I won’t give it away). This is an engaging book. While reading it, I was reminded of how I felt in the 1990s as the only black girl attending an all white school and all the anger I had inside of me (due to overt and covert racism)… and my unproductive way of channeling it. I like that the character is 17 years old. There aren’t many books out there in which it is fictional account of a young black women dealing with the issues of sex, sexuality, racism, class, etc. Thanks Freedom for sharing this with us.

Here is more information about the book and Freedom: The Official Manjani Website Sistahs on the Shelf Freedom’s Facebook Page Freedom’s Myspace Page