Lola Akinmade Åkerström

An AMAZON Best of the Month Pick Good Morning America (GMA) Book Club Buzz Pick Finalist - 2022 AAMBC Literary Award for both eBook & audiobook Shortlist - 2021 Outstanding Works of Literature (OWL) Award Shortlist - 2021 Bad Form Book of the Year -------------------------------------------------- A timely and arresting debut for anyone looking for insight into what it means to be a Black woman in the world. Three Black women are linked in unexpected ways to the same influential white man in Stockholm as they build their new lives in the most open society run by the most private people. Successful marketing executive Kemi Adeyemi is lured from the U.S. to Sweden by Jonny von Lundin, CEO of the nation's largest marketing firm, to help fix a PR fiasco involving a racially tone-deaf campaign. A killer at work but a failure in love, Kemi's move is a last-ditch effort to reclaim her social life. A chance meeting with Jonny in business class en route to the U.S. propels former model-turned-flight-attendant Brittany-Rae Johnson into a life of wealth, luxury, and privilege—a life she's not sure she wants—as the object of his unhealthy obsession. And refugee Muna Saheed, who lost her entire family, finds a job cleaning the toilets at Jonny's office as she works to establish her residency in Sweden and, more importantly, seeks connection and a place she can call home. Told through the perspectives of each of the three women, In Every Mirror She's Black is a fast-paced, richly nuanced yet accessible contemporary novel that touches on important social issues of racism, classism, fetishization, and tokenism, and what it means to be a Black woman navigating a white-dominated society. Lola Akinmade Åkerström is an African-American (Nigerian-American) award-winning author, speaker, and photographer based in Sweden. This is her first novel.

NAACP Image Award Nominee for Outstanding Literature. A Jennette McCurdy Book Club Pick. Amazon Editors' Pick for Best Literature & Fiction. As seen in The Sunday Times, Washington Post, Shondaland, Vanity Fair, MSN, and more From international bestselling author Lola Akinmade Åkerström, the highly anticipated follow-up to her debut novel, In Every Mirror She's Black, focusing on the lives of three Black women as they fight their own personal struggles in one of the most egalitarian societies, Sweden. Can a career woman truly have it all? Powerful marketing executive Kemi Adeyemi has finally found the man she needs, but Tobias Wikström thinks she's the most selfish woman he has ever met for asking him to give up his life in Sweden and move to the US for her own comfort. Will Kemi be forced to stay if she wants to keep him while chipping away at her hard-earned career? As things begin to sour and challenge her relationship with Tobias, someone else moves back into the picture. Can having it all be a gilded cage? Looking into divorce in Sweden isn't what former model-turned-flight attendant Brittany-Rae von Lundin anticipated. Only jointly owned assets are split evenly between couples. Brittany gave up her career and came with nothing into Jonny's kingdom. Having had a child with him, her greatest fear for Maya includes being cut off from the resources she's become accustomed to. With a man obsessed with a ghost, trying to get away isn't going to be easy. And the deeper she digs into his past, the darker the secrets she unravels. Can you run from your past to have it all? After fleeing her home through a client to seek a new life in Sweden, Yasmiin finds love in the arms of Yagiz Çelik while carving out her own small corner. But as someone from her past forces Yasmiin to become a caretaker before she's ready, she now must confront and move beyond her teenage history, while following her dreams of becoming a makeup artist. Everything Is Not Enough follows the loosely intertwined and messy lives of Kemi, Brittany, and Yasmiin as they interrogate themes of place, prejudice, and patriarchy in Europe, proving--yet again--that Lola Akinmade Åkerström is the next great voice of nuanced contemporary women's fiction.

Two women. Four decades. A lifetime of secrets. 1978: A scholarship draws Nancy from Gambia's warmth into Sweden's winter. When her friendship with charismatic scholar Lars blossoms into something more, she thinks she may have finally found her place. But there's more to Lars than his charming persona, and Nancy is about to discover the danger of being drawn into his world. 2006: Tina has had her taste of fame as the nation's sweetheart pop princess. But beneath her glittery façade, Tina is desperate to discover who she really is. Her mother, Nancy, seems desperate to keep the past under wraps, but will an unexpected figure help open the door? Spanning four decades and three continents, Bitter Honey is a story of mothers, daughters, and the importance of carving your own path.