Months after starting a book club to highlight writers of color, Chicago rapper Noname announced Saturday that the Chicago Public Library is now taking reservations for copies of the latest literary selections.
Noname, whose real name is Fatimah Warner, launched the book club in August and began featuring two monthly selections — one “informative text” and another “creative work.” Chicagoans looking to read along can use the library website to place a hold on recent picks.
In a tweet announcing the new arrangement, Noname’s Book Club lauded the new library policy to stop charging late fees and took a shot at the online retail giant Amazon. Members of the club are instead encouraged to purchase texts from local shops that amplify the voices of authors of color.
That recommendation is fitting for Noname, who tweeted in July that her mother was the first black woman to own a bookstore in Chicago, noting that the book club “will honor that legacy.”
CHICAGO: We are now working with @chipublib to bring you all the monthly titles for free! Chicago is one of the first cities to stop charging late fees on books!!!!!!
— Noname Book Club (@NonameBooks) November 16, 2019
Save money,🖕🏾@amazon https://t.co/xXol7AMQqZ
The latest additions to the reading list were the poetry collection “How to Cure a Ghost” by Fariha Róisín and “Parable of the Sower” by Octavia E. Butler — which was selected by the Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter Kehlani, Noname’s second famous friend to make a pick. In October, rapper Earl Sweatshirt chose Eduardo Galeano’s “Faces & Masks: Memory of Fire, Volume 2.”
During an appearance last month on “The Daily Show,” Noname explained that the idea to create the book club was sparked by a weed-induced online conversation she had about Kali Akuno’s and Ajamu Nangwaya’s “Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, Mississippi.”
“Someone tweeted me like, ‘Yo, let’s be pen pals. I’m reading the same book,’” Noname told host Trevor Noah. “I was high and I posted it and was like, ‘Oh my God, I should create a book club.’ So yeah, I created a book club.”
Noname rose from relative obscurity in 2013 when she delivered a standout verse on Chance the Rapper’s song “Lost.” Since then, she has released a pair of critically acclaimed studio albums and recently formed a hip-hop supergroup with Saba and Smino.
