Recs if you like Witch Queen Rising...

Representations of the Black experience through fantasy, science fiction, and speculative fiction. Recommendations welcome!

I'm sure some of these are already on your TBR, so might as well add some more! Let me know if I am missing any of your favorites!

Fiction & nonfiction books that explore the complexities and traumas of mother-child relationships or in which such relationships play a central role. While many books on this list are what I’d classify as including “mommy issues” there are others that are more about the different perspectives and nuances of the mother-child (often specifically mother-daughter) relationship. Some books center the child, some the mother, some both.

Suggestions are welcome.

Here are some fantasy novels with black FMCs!

This list was generated from a post on pagebound club on Juneteenth in 2026. I opted to not try and make this list comprehensive but just to document the community recs from that day - however, if you have more books to recommend please comment in the forum! Prompts from the original post will be in the comments. Note: prompts asked for books by Black authors, not only those from/books set in the US. See comments section for more discussion.

books by black authors and/or with black characters

Be the trend setter of your book club or bookish friend group by getting to know the authors of next year’s publication cycle. These books are all by new talent in the publishing world from both the Big 5 and small, traditional publishers.

Be sure to also check out these authors on social media for ARC opportunities, and show these authors some love by requesting a purchase with your local library, or pre-ordering a copy yourself!

spooky season might be over but my itch for witchy books is never over

Books with black people in it (mostly as the mains characters)

Both Fiction and Non fiction books.

Ancestral curses, strange bloodlines, magical lineage, family secrets, and more! There's something about these families...

The books that I saw being recommended instead of ACOTAR so I want to give them a go

Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

I wanted to create a list of my favorite genres of novels specifically written by black authors. A lot of the fantasy/scifi novels being pushed and promoted extensively, are written by white authors, so I was hoping that I could grow this list with underrated publications in order to diversify my reading taste. This list only includes Adult Fantasy/Sci-Fi standalones or the first book of a series. It doesn't count for romance, romantasy, or even YA novels.

Witchy books of all varieties.