Anchored in History with Tara Roberts

[00:00:00] This idea of raising history from the depths, it felt like that was something that was powerful. Because when you know where you come from, it helps you get where you're trying to go. What's good? I'm Nikesha Elise Williams and this is Black & Published on the Mahogany Books Podcast Network. Bringing you the journeys of writers, poets, playwrights, and storytellers of all kinds. Today's guest is Tara Roberts, author of the memoir Written in the Waters,

[00:00:29] a memoir of history, home, and belonging. It's an epic story of Tara fulfilling her childhood desire of becoming a writer, commingled with her active decision to embrace a past she'd always run from. Our history was just full of so much pain and so much trauma and I just didn't want to touch it. I never thought that my work would be connected to history and the slave trade again. This is a sci-fi

[00:00:57] future girl who's now centered in the past. Storyteller, adventurer, and traveler. Tara is now an explorer in residence at National Geographic, where she contains the work she's done since 2016 as a scuba diver working with groups like Diving With A Purpose to map and document slave shipwrecks. I first was introduced to Tara's work through her award-winning podcast with Nat Geo, Into the Depths, and then had the pleasure of

[00:01:26] coaching her for her TEDx Jacksonville talk. I'll link to both in the show notes. But in this conversation, Tara goes deep about the trauma she experienced that made her fear becoming a writer. Plus, how she confronted and healed her own feelings of shame around blackness and identity. And, the grace she had to find for herself and others when she was not embraced on the continent of Africa. That and more is next, when Black & Published continues.

[00:02:02] Tara, when did you know that you were a writer? Will it sound crazy if I say just a few years ago? I mean, I always kept a journal, always wrote on some level, and I wanted to be a writer. But I had a traumatic experience in college that made me decide

[00:02:26] that I wasn't good enough to be a writer. Like, I took all the sort of writing English-related classes that I could take. And I remember in all of my classes, I would work so hard. Like, I would, you know, some people would just write their papers the day of, the night before. I would labor over

[00:02:49] my essays for weeks, and then I would turn them in, and I could never seem to get an A. Always came back with marks on my paper, with comments, and other people would get A's. And I decided, well, maybe I'm not a writer. Maybe that's just not who I am. But my last semester of senior year, I did an

[00:03:14] independent study, and I decided to write stories about black students on campus. And it had more of a journalistic sort of feel. And that was the first time I got an A. But I'd been so beat down over the earlier four years that it wasn't enough for me to think that I was a writer. And even, last thing I'll say, even when I went to work for professional magazines, like, I felt connected to the word.

[00:03:43] So I knew I had a connection to words, but I was like, well, maybe I'm an editor, because I feel like I can recognize good writing. So that was my thing. I was like, I'll just be an editor who recognizes good writing, and I'll support other writers. But even when I got to Essence, and I ended up writing a cover story for the magazine. I was like 24 at the time. And all these grown, amazing editors that

[00:04:09] I had admired and loved were like, oh my god, that was such a good piece. Like, you did a great job. I still didn't believe them. I was like, oh, I got lucky with that one piece. So I've always had sort of this complex that maybe I'm not really a writer until recently. But then your career took you lots of different places, but it always was in connection to the word.

[00:04:39] Were those choices deliberate? Or was that just like the jobs that you applied for that were going to pay the bills? No, no, no, no. I mean, I felt connected to the word. And I wanted to do this. I was just like, I didn't know if I was good enough. But that didn't stop me from still doing it. I couldn't step away from it, because it was like my deepest dream was to write it. I would read those long stories in like Outside Magazine and National Geographic and love them. I would read the

[00:05:06] books. I would love them. And I was afraid that I wasn't good enough to do them. When did you conquer that fear? This is gonna sound so crazy, because I'm like a grown person now. And I have a lot of pieces that I have written. But I think it really was when the cover story of Nachio Magazine came out. And I was

[00:05:32] like, oh, I'm a writer. I was like, I wrote a story that is a cover story for National Geographic Magazine, which was something that I had read as a young person, wished, dreamed that I could write something that would belong in that publication. And I remember when I wrote the story. I mean, it went through the editing process, but it didn't get edited a lot. Like instead of back in college,

[00:06:03] where I would have the red marks on my paper, like most of my words made it all the way through. What was that cover story? It was the story of my journey following a group of black scuba divers around the world as they searched for and documented slave shipwrecks. So this was me writing an adventure story. Do you know, like it was a big story and it was my own personal journey as well.

[00:06:32] And I don't know- You were also on the cover. Yeah, I was on the cover. Um, don't get shy now. You're so funny. But I will say that doing that kind of writing that I'd always dreamed doing finally and having a nationally recognized brand really embrace that made me feel like, okay,

[00:07:01] yeah, that was when I knew. What do you think it was about that story in your journey at the time and documenting the black scuba divers who were documenting these slave shipwrecks that aligned for you to finally claim something that you had wanted so badly since you were a child? Hmm. I think on some level, I didn't, again, this is around the knowing and the deeply believing

[00:07:31] that black people could have those sort of adventures and write those sort of stories. But it really was, and I tell this story all the time. In 2016, I visited the National Museum of African American History and Culture. And I saw this picture of a group of black women in wetsuits on a boat. I had never seen a group of black women in wetsuits on a boat before.

[00:08:00] So I saw people who looked like me doing this thing that just felt so adventurous. The whole thing about like representation is important. And then I discovered that they were part of this group on a mission to search for and document slave shipwrecks. And I was like, what? Are you kidding me?

[00:08:26] This is incredible. I mean, I stayed and I looked at that exhibit for at least an hour. Like I just, I looked at the exhibit, I read the things, I Googled them. I stayed up there on that floor for the longest. And I think perhaps it connected to that dream that I had as a child. I mean, I was a nerd. I love to read

[00:08:53] books and I love to read fantasy books the most. And I love to read the stories of people who were, these characters who were on quests and who were trying to like change the world or save the world or slay the dragon. That's the sort of storytelling that I wanted to do as a young person. And there was something about seeing those divers deciding that I was going to do whatever I could to join their

[00:09:21] quest that I think opened all of this up for me again. Okay. So we have your origin story and the knowing with the Nat Geo article. Did you know from that article that there was a book in you on the same subject, but much deeper into your own story or was like, okay, I did this article. I'm a writer now and we're about to go on adventures around the world, chasing these shipwrecks and documenting

[00:09:50] the divers. I would say I suspected that there was more. I saw the picture. I called them up. They invited me to come and dive with them. I was like, yes. And I actually was not thinking about telling a story then. I just wanted to dive with them. I wanted to do something that helped make a difference in the world. All of this, as I said, was happening in 2016,

[00:10:15] which if anyone can remember, 2016 was, I think, a year when race in particular became a center in the national consciousness. And it was very apparent to see the fractures that we had inside of the race conversation. And I wanted to do something to really help heal

[00:10:39] those fractures, but I didn't know what to do. And then I come across these divers and I'm like, maybe there's a way that I can help do something. I just wanted to be a part of doing something. And this idea of raising history from the depths, like raising forgotten history, it felt like that was something that was powerful and that could help us on a deeply subconscious level

[00:11:06] too. Because when you know where you come from, it helps you get where you're trying to go. So initially, all I wanted to do was to be a part of it. But then as I started to meet these divers and hang out with them, it took me over a year to get properly trained to be able to dive with them. I was like, oh my God, these people are characters. They are funny, loud, crazy,

[00:11:34] and they are incredible human beings because none of them got paid for the work that they were doing. They were volunteering their time to help other people get trained and then to do this work. And I also, I was working in a job that didn't have anything to do with writing. When I started to get to know them, something clicked and I was like, oh my God, maybe this is how I get back to write.

[00:12:02] Like I felt called to help tell the stories about them. So then I applied for a grant with National Geographic. It took a moment, but I finally got, I got a grant from them. And the grant really was initially, it was just writing blog entries about the divers and about my journey. I didn't know that. Like, I didn't know this history. So I didn't know how deep and

[00:12:29] big it was. I was like, oh, I'm loving these divers and I just want to tell their stories. But as I traveled and we were doing the group diving with a purpose was doing missions in Mozambique and South Africa, in Senegal, Costa Rica, St. Croix, like they were all over the world. And I was traveling with them and I was like, I don't know half of this story. Not even like,

[00:12:56] I didn't know any of this story. There's just so much to uncover and so much to process. And as I traveled, I started to realize I couldn't tell this story in 200 word blog entries. Duh, writing about the slave trade. Like that just doesn't make any sense. Need more words. Right. So I knew that there was a bigger story to tell, but I went back to Nat Geo and that's when

[00:13:24] they gave me funding to do the podcast into the depths. And we did that podcast. And that was great. We did six episodes, 30 minutes each that are telling a deeper story about six of the wrecks and more of the divers. And it also began to tell my own personal journey. And I actually, I wasn't thinking

[00:13:47] about any of this impacting me personally, like in this stupid, it's like, how am I going to go black girl writing about the slave trade and think that that is not a history that's going to impact me in some way. But I wasn't, I was thinking collectively as black people, we need to know this history. The world needs to know this history. This will change the way that little black girls and boys

[00:14:10] and non-binary children begin to see themselves. So I was out there thinking about it. But as I traveled, I was like, Oh no, I got to confront my own self around some of this stuff. So this is a very long way to answer your question and say, yes, I suspected that there had to be a book if I was

[00:14:34] going to tell more of that story. Okay. So like that sneaking suspicion that I have to tell my own story and confront my own ish for you, that was confronting your relationship to blackness and race and the history of being black in America specifically. And then as you were traveling,

[00:15:00] what it means to be black globally and reading the book, it made me think of President Obama's first memoir, dreams of my father, where he talks about like trying to figure out who he is and what he is and where he belongs with all of his background. And yet you knew your background, but ran from it.

[00:15:25] Why? Just so you know, I grew up in Atlanta with my mom. It was just the two of us. Even though my mother comes from a really big family. So she had 13 brothers and sisters. Growing up, my mother was a person who loved to look back. Like she was the person who was trying to get the family tree drawn up and,

[00:15:51] you know, hiring illustrators to build the tree so that we could show it at the reunion. She was like, oh, you know, what happened to blah, blah, and blah, blah. And she would have those sort of stories. And she had photographs of our ancestors on her wall. None of that ever interests me. Not really. Like I knew who my grandmother was. My grandfather had passed away before I was born. And I loved my

[00:16:19] grandmother. She passed away when I was in my late teens, early twenties. And my grandmother was as far back as I wanted to go. I just, I felt like our history was just full of so much pain and so much trauma. And I just didn't want to touch it. Anyway, I've said before, I'm, I was this fantasy girl,

[00:16:46] like, and I love sci-fi. Like I'm watching Star Trek. I want to think about the future and where we're going and not think about the past. So that's sort of always been kind of my outlook on life. But hello, I'm drawn to look at slave shipwreck. So there's no way that I can avoid looking at the past. And I think it was when I met the descendants of the ancestors that came over on the Clotilda ship.

[00:17:15] And the Clotilda is the most recent slave ship that was found off the coast of Alabama. It was found in the Mobile River. And those descendants, they knew who came over on the boat because those people came over in 1860, which was five years before the Civil War ended. So I got a chance to hang out with these descendants. And it was astonishing that they didn't have any shame over their ancestors.

[00:17:44] or their past. They weren't leaning into the pain and the trauma. They were so proud of their ancestors. And it made me go, well, wait a minute. I got ancestors. I got ancestors? But it made me curious to know, like, well, what kind of stories do my ancestors have?

[00:18:11] And I had never thought to find those answers before. I'm like, oh, whatever. It's just too hard. But then that made me hire a genealogist who did some tracing because I was like, well, maybe we can trace back to a ship. Maybe I can find out where I come from on the continent. Spoiler alert, I was not able to

[00:18:35] find the connection to the ship. But I did find information that I did not know about my great, great grandpa Jack, who was born enslaved in North Carolina in 1837. And the information that we found out just it did the exact same thing that the information Jeremy had about his family did for him.

[00:19:00] It made me so proud of Jack. I was like, okay, I can't believe that I have not wanted to know this man and his history. When it came time for you to really enter the publishing process and write the book proposal and like do the thing and put the words on the page, what was that process like for you?

[00:19:23] I was excited to do it. Number one, I think writing the article and doing the podcast gave me a bit of a structure in my mind. The podcast that I did was a narrative podcast that was highly produced. And we had to think a lot about how do we bring in the stories of the ships? How do we bring in the stories of the divers? How do we bring in my story? How do we weave it together? The book ended up,

[00:19:52] it's pretty different from the podcast, but it has a skeleton that is related. And so when I sat down to write the proposal, I felt like I was like, oh, I know where this book is going to go. Went in completely different directions, but I was like, I got it. It's going to be like that.

[00:20:16] You know, writing a book, man, it's its own beast and it will take you where it wants to take you. Right. I know. Like you thought this is what it was going to be. And you thought wrong, right? Like stuff was showing up in the book that I was like, oh, we're going there. I didn't know we were going to go there. Oh, that's the memory that wants to be included here. Oh, okay. Yeah.

[00:20:43] You were very candid. You were very candid. I would like to have that conversation off mic and not recording. But okay. So you wrote the proposal and you were surprised by all the stories that were coming up. Reading the book, it's a memoir, but it also reads like a travelogue in the way that you've written it, where you take us to the different countries and the different places and the struggles and bringing

[00:21:12] all of that to the forefront in the book and telling your story about the life that you've had and the life that you were pursuing. Cause like you've been an editor, you worked in nonprofits, you started a magazine, you started your own nonprofit, you've done all the things, but it seems like getting to that image in 2016 and the Blacksonian and then following that, wherever it led you, I feel like, and I don't want to misread you, but I feel like that has

[00:21:42] fundamentally changed your perspective on who and what you are and what you do. Let me know if I'm wrong. The way that I look at my life now is that all of it has been leading to this. And I don't think that this is the end point of my life. I'm sure this is now leading to whatever else is going on, but all the things feel like they've been in preparation for this moment. I never imagined

[00:22:12] that National Geographic would be a part of my world. I'm now an explorer in residence there. So they are wrapping around me to do an even bigger project that is connected to this. I never thought that my work would be connected to history and the slave trade. I'm fairly,

[00:22:35] a nomadic person who's had a lot of different addresses over the last 20 years. I'm single, I don't have children. So in some ways I've been floating around the world and this work has rooted me in a way that I wasn't expecting, but that I feel grateful for. So that feels right.

[00:22:59] So then can you read something from the book where you talk about the work and how it's rooting you to where you are in your life. Tara Roberts' book, Written in the Waters, a memoir of history, home, and belonging,

[00:23:14] details Tara's journey from a bookish black girl who preferred the fantasies of Mrs. Who, Mrs. What's It, and Mrs. Witch from A Wrinkle in Time to becoming a woman whose fascination with black scuba diapers led her to the watery graves of wrecked slave ships. It is a story of self-discovery and acceptance that through travel and confrontation allowed her to eschew her shame of her enslaved roots and accept them with pride and joy. Here's Tara. Tara Roberts' book, Written in the Waters, a memoir of the Waters, a memoir of the

[00:23:42] Well, just to set it up. When I started this journey, I didn't have an assignment and I didn't have funding from anyone. I just knew that I wanted to be a part of this work and to do something. And so I'd quit my job. I'd gotten certified as a scuba diver while I was still working, but I had to get in 30 dives in order to participate in Diving with a Purpose.

[00:24:09] And I'd already been planning to go to India because a coworker was getting married. And so I was going to use my frequent flying miles to go to India. And I realized as I was planning, I was like, well, if I'm going to be in India, like some of the greatest diving happens in Southeast Asia and it's fairly inexpensive to like hang out in Southeast Asia.

[00:24:33] So I made this decision. So I made this decision to go to Sri Lanka and Thailand and to get my dives in. But before I could get my dives in, I needed to apply for funding because I was like, dude, you really got to get some money coming in to like cover all of this.

[00:24:49] So I had applied for funding that I did not get. And I was pretty disappointed about that. And right after that, I went out on a dive and I had an encounter with wildlife and I was injured from that encounter. And I just felt so like, what, like, what am I doing? How, why is this not working out for me?

[00:25:16] Yeah. So this is the next morning as I am dealing with my injured self and feeling sorry for myself. Now it's early the next morning. I've walked down to the beach and I'm sitting with my bottom in the water, allowing the surf to rush up and away, waiting for the sun to rise, holding my bloodied bandaged fingers straight in the air away from the water.

[00:25:45] I look at it and think angrily. A piece of my finger was bitten off in the waters around Sri Lanka. Now that I'm no longer in shock, I can't believe what just happened. Why is this so hard? I think I left my job, my home, spent all my savings, committed to finding a way to untangle this twisty, complicated, dark cloud of history that weighs us all down.

[00:26:12] And first, the bad news about the funding. And now I've lost the tip of my finger. It's too much. I feel tears threaten. A piece of me was taken away. A piece I'm never going to get back. And it happened in the place I'd come for answers. The sun rises. The whole area is suddenly painted in warm yellows and oranges.

[00:26:41] As the sun gains traction in the sky, I feel its glare on me. It's like it's pinning me to my place, daring me to remember that I come from Black magic women who endured tragedy but kept on moving on. Months in the cargo hold of those boats facing horrors I'll never even let myself imagine.

[00:27:05] Working in fields until fingers and feet bled and backs gave out under the crack of cruel whips. Their babies sold before weaning. Their husbands killed for protesting. Women bearing the weight and entry of unwanted men. Tongues silenced for speaking out. Injustice upon injustice. Century after century.

[00:27:35] The sun reminds me that I don't have the privilege or freedom or even permission of my ancestors to feel sorry for myself. Thank you. So that was Sri Lanka and Thailand. You get as many dives in as possible and they let you continue on in the missions. I want to talk about when you get on the continent of Africa and you go from South Africa, then I think you go up to like Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire.

[00:28:04] And you're bouncing around, you're following the mission, but also hanging out with some friends, meeting other people and having this like reckoning on the continent of like, when you see the diaspora wars flare up on the internet, you're doing this in person.

[00:28:21] And I wanted to start with, you talk about being challenged about religion and family and where you're from and the people you met while there that put the work that you were doing and then eventually writing about in your memoir into a greater perspective and context of how much history we don't know about.

[00:28:47] How slavery and the transatlantic slave trade specifically transformed and remade the world. Yeah. The first part of that question is about grace and about extending it to others and to myself. And I will say that that took me some time. When I first got to the continent, I started in Mozambique and I've traveled to Africa before.

[00:29:16] I even spent a summer living in Zimbabwe right after college. And I've sensed, I've traveled to the continent. I'm not a neophyte in any way. So I know that it's a complex place. But somehow on this trip, I went with some romantic notions. And perhaps that was because I was doing this work of searching into the past and specifically looking at slave shipwrecks.

[00:29:45] And so I think I was raw and sensitive. And I thought because I was on this kind of mission, that there would be an embrace of me. I didn't get that sort of reaction from the people I was encountering. I wasn't embraced. People weren't like, oh, long lost sister, you're home. Yes.

[00:30:09] And it took me a while to understand my own desires for that and to understand why that wasn't happening. But eventually I think I got to a place of grace for myself, for not knowing. And I got to a place where I really got on a deep level that Africa is a continent. Like, of course, I know that. I absolutely know that.

[00:30:36] But I think that the way that I was interacting with it was if it was not a continent with 54 countries. Like 54 countries. Different countries. Different countries. Morocco is not like Mozambique. South Africa is not like Kenya. Like they are very different with different histories. Libya and Liberia are not the same. And it's a complex history.

[00:31:04] One of the things I say in the book is I think that, don't quote me on the numbers now, but it's more than 2,000 ethnicities on the continent. In Europe, there's less than 160. You know, like 2,000 ethnicities. More than 2,000 languages.

[00:31:25] You know, there's only a way that Western colonizers came in and saw Brown and just decided it was all the same. And I realized that my motives were different. My connection was different. I was seeing us all as the same. But growing up in the U.S. is very different than growing up in Mozambique. Growing up as a woman, like there's so many layers to our identities.

[00:31:53] Such complexity there. But I had flattened it. One of my favorite stories in the book is when you talk about you were sleeping and the ancestors woke you up out of your sleep with a word. And you write it down phonetically in your notebook. And then when you get to the continent of Africa, that word comes back. Can you talk about the moment? Because it seems so transcendent. Yeah, I didn't know what had happened.

[00:32:21] This was right before I was to leave to go on the journey. And I keep a notebook next to my bed because I sort of believe in dream work and I pay attention to my dreams. And so sometimes when they're strong, I try to capture while I'm still in sleep mode. I try to capture what I can remember. And then when the morning comes, if I've written down enough, it sparks the memory and helps me to flesh it out.

[00:32:49] And that night I was asleep and it really felt like a chorus of voices were whispering into my ear. And they were whispering this word. Let's write this word down. And I didn't know what the word was. And so I spelled it E-E-W-A-Y or W-A-H.

[00:33:17] I don't quite remember which one it was. And then I went back to sleep. And I woke up the next morning and I saw, and I was like, oh, I had that dream. I can't wait to see what I wrote. Because it felt like it was something that was important that it happened. And then I look at the word and I was like, did I? I thought I remembered enough to write. I was like, I guess I didn't think that it was important. I just, I had no idea what that might mean.

[00:33:44] But I put it in my iPhone in the notes section just to have it there. And so then fast forward, it's around three to four months later. I'm in Togo. And the driver, because I hired a guide. I never hire guides. Like normally I show up to countries and I just find my way. But I was like, oh no, we're not doing that here. One, I don't speak the language. And it's just a whole other word. I was like, no, no, no. We're going to have a guide that's going to help us.

[00:34:14] So this great guy, we were together constantly. And when we first met, he was so excited to be taking an African-American around. He's like, I've never taken an African-American around. Like normally it's Europeans, white Europeans or white Americans. So he was really excited to hang out with me and excited to share. And I was just curious about all the things.

[00:34:37] And partly because like when I got to Togo for the first time in all of my trips to Africa, I felt like I saw people who looked like me. Driving around Togo, I was like, I like myself in the facial features of these people, which is also interesting because I thought that my family looked the way we look because

[00:35:06] of all the mixtures that have happened, you know, like there is, as there are in most Black American families, there is European blood, Native American blood, like there are all these things. And I thought it was the mixture of all those things that made us look distinctly African-American. It's straight up African. And so anyway, I was so excited to be there.

[00:35:31] And as the driver and guide and I are traveling around, I ask him, I'm like, who lives in Togo? And so he begins to break down the various ethnic groups. And then he gets to this one where he's just like, and the e-way are big here. And he spells it out. He's got like a gap between his teeth. And he's just like, E-W-E.

[00:36:00] He didn't spell out any of the other ones, but he spelled out that one. E-way. And it just hit me. I was like, wait. And then I looked on my phone and I saw what I had written down and I was like, that is exactly how it sounded in my ear. Oh my God. So it was, yeah, I was like, ooh, wow. Were the ancestors trying to tell you something right then?

[00:36:30] And I didn't know what it was because I had also done my African ancestry DNA kit. And it said my people were the Bama Lake people in Cameroon. So I was like, e-way, like what is, and they don't show up for me on ancestry.com. But I also think that, I don't know. I do think that they are likely a part of me, but I also think that the ancestors were like, this is important.

[00:36:57] They were directing me to focus because the ancestors that were on the Clotilda also came from Benin and Togo. Even though you were only able to trace your lineage back to your great-grandpa Jack, and you weren't able to find the exact ship like the descendants of the Clotilda, do you feel as if having that voice, despite what ancestry and African ancestry and the results say, having

[00:37:25] been told and then having it confirmed and spelled out for you gives you a place where you can like really claim and know like, yeah, our people came from Togo. Do you feel like you can make that claim? Or do you still feel like, eh, I think so. But maybe because we don't have the exact documents. One of the things that was a big learning for me about the impact of the slave trade on Africa

[00:37:54] was the way that it displaced so many people and created borders where there were no borders. It separated ethnic groups and turned them into different groups that no longer communicated with each other in the same way. So a part of me thinks that there was a lot of movement happening and that probably both things are true.

[00:38:20] You know, like, yeah, there were probably Bama Lakey like people, maybe they, their origins were from Benin and Togo and they made their way to Cameroon or the other way. Yeah, I think that there's, there's a way that it's all, I claim it all. How has writing this book changed you? Well, this is the first book that I have written from cover to cover.

[00:38:50] So to know that I did it, I'm so proud of myself for doing it. And I also feel like the book helped me connect dots that I wouldn't have connected otherwise. So I had all the experiences, but it wasn't until I sat down to write them that I made sense of all of these things that happened. I don't know that I was even thinking about great, great grandpa Jack in that way. Like I was feeling him.

[00:39:17] But when I really started to write, I was feeling Jack and I felt very, um, like I needed to have his picture near me. I was like, Jack, he's really important. And that came because of me writing the book, you know? So, you know. Yeah. When you open the door, they walk in. All right.

[00:39:47] I want to move to a speed round a little game before I let you go for the afternoon. What is your favorite book? I used to have three favorites, but I don't think they're my favorites anymore. This is when I was growing up and I would reread these books every single year. So one was Mama Day by Gloria Naylor. The Temple of My Familiar by Alice Walker and The Mists of Avalon. It's a King author story, but it's told from the point of view of the women.

[00:40:18] Like I used to love those three books. I don't know that they are favorites anymore, though. And then growing up, it was A Wrinkle in Time was my favorite when I was young. But I reread A Wrinkle in Time as an adult and I was like, oh, I don't know that it would be my favorite anymore. Who is your favorite author? I have been like in this fantasy world a lot lately.

[00:40:45] So I won't say any classic names. I'll do sort of fantasy people. And these are the people that I'm liking right now. So I'm not mad at N.K. Jemisin. I've been enjoying her work lately. Even though her book was really hard to read, it was so hard. But I think she's a really talented writer. Rivers Solomon. I don't know if you know her.

[00:41:11] And oh, this was also a hard one, but I thought she was a brilliant writer. Is Yaa Nasi? She wrote Homegoing? Yaa Jesse. Yeah. What's, say her name for me again. I believe that her last name is pronounced Jesse. Jesse. I believe. Don't kill me if it's not. But yeah, she wrote Homegoing. She's Gainian. Yes. Oh, that book destroyed me. It was so good. It's just excellent. So there's no fantasy.

[00:41:40] Okay, this is great. Also, there's a young adult author that I am checking for right now. And I've really enjoyed reading her. It's Justina Ireland. She has a book about, it's the zombie apocalypse, but it's set in reconstruction time. And so it's Black girls who are the ones that are zombie killers. Anyway, I'm not mad at her imagination. And that's four.

[00:42:10] It's another sort of fantasy writer, Gail Carriger. She has all these really steampunk kind of books. And they are funny with a lot of vampires and werewolves in them. Name three things on your bucket list because you've done a lot. I'm curious. I have not been to Japan yet. So I've got to go to Japan. I would love to go paragliding. And I want to learn how to surf. It tracks.

[00:42:41] Dive under the water, surf on top of the water. It tracks. What brings you joy? I love fresh, sweet mangoes. Like to sit and eat a really good mango and have like the juice dripping down your hands and your mouth all wet with mango juices. I love that. I get joy being on a dance floor with the music pumping.

[00:43:12] Just being able to dance gives me joy. Reading a really great fantasy book gives me a lot of joy. And what brings you peace? Walks near water. Playing with kittens or puppies brings me some peace. Drinking a really great chai latte brings me so much peace. Like a really good one. All right.

[00:43:41] So our game is called Rewriting the Classics. Classic is however you define it. Name one book you wished you would have written. Ooh, all the Harry Potter books. Yeah, all the Harry Potter books. All right. Name one book where you want to change the ending and how would you do it? Harry Potter, the seventh book. I hated the way it ended. Okay.

[00:44:12] And then name a book that you think is overrated or overtaught and why. Now I have to remember what's on the syllabus. Like what books are taught in school? I can't think of a single book right now. I'm like Shakespeare's taught, but I don't. I think Shakespeare is brilliant in his own way. I don't think that shouldn't be taught. I really, I just, I went blank. I don't know. No worries. Final question for you today.

[00:44:41] When you are dead and gone and among the ancestors, what would you like someone to write about the legacy of words and work that you've left behind? She wrote with heart. And she had us thinking about things we never thought to think about. Big thank you to Tara Roberts for being here today on Black & Published. You can follow Tara on the socials at Tara Roberts underscore Explorer on Instagram.

[00:45:09] And make sure you check out Written in the Waters, a memoir of history, home, and belonging, out now from Nat Geo Books. You can get a copy of Written in the Waters from Mahogany Books and get 10% off your first purchase using code BLACKPUB at checkout. That's B-L-K-P-U-B. That's our show for the week. If you like this episode and want more Black & Published, head to our Instagram page.

[00:45:36] It's at blackandpublished, and that's B-L-K-andpublished. There, I've posted a bonus clip from my interview with Tara about her time with one of the descendants of the Quotilda and how his story helped inspire her own genealogical search. Make sure you check it out and let me know what you think in the comments. I'll holla at y'all next week when our guest will be Shannora Williams, author of Beautiful Broken Love. There are different ways to grieve.

[00:46:06] We all have to go through that process of grief, but I think there are people who do it differently. So if they can get that from this or feel any type of connection to Davina's grief or even Deke's grief and know that there is like joy in between and passion and happiness, and that you heal in a different way. If somebody can just heal through it, that'll be great. That's next week on Black and Published. I'll talk to you then. Peace.

[00:46:40] What's going on, family? This is Derek Young. And Ramonda Young. Owners of both Mahogany Books and the Mahogany Books Podcast Network. We really want to thank each and every one of you for listening to this episode. And if you enjoyed what you just heard, drop us a review and rate us on whatever platform you download podcasts on. We truly appreciate each and every one of you for supporting us and making us your go-to for Black books. And we look forward to connecting with you all sometime in the future. Thank you again, fam. And always remember, Black Books Matter.