For too long the Black best friend—the sidekick to the White girl main character—has been a staple in literature for young people by non-Black writers. This two-dimensional stock character has served several purposes: meeting her White friend’s emotional needs, supporting the White character’s personal growth, and implicitly signaling the supposed moral goodness of that White protagonist. The Black BFF doesn’t have a well-developed backstory or arc of her own, making her a prop more than a recognizable person. (I’m focusing here on a common dynamic with women and girls; other genders face related but slightly different literary obstacles.)
Even as more White authors recognize the need to reflect real-world diversity in their books, there are too many recent titles that continue to feature this trope. Books regularly cross my desk in which the Black best friend is beautiful, athletic, a top student, self-aware, empathetic, emotionally giving—and more. As YA authors have started paying more attention to systemic racism and its impact on young people's lives, an additional burden has been placed on these characters’ shoulders: educating their White friends about the realities of race.
While surely intended by their creators to be positive, these too-perfect characters are so far from the complex, messy realities of adolescence—especially when lived at the intersection of racial and gender bias—that they read like the mirror image of lazy, negative stereotypes rather than true progress toward inclusivity. And joining the Black friend who exemplifies superheroic perfection is a new stock figure I keep encountering: the Black woman therapist. The nature of the therapist-client relationship is such that readers would not expect to learn much about the therapist, neatly allowing her sole purpose to be that of serving the White character’s needs. Each individual instance may not feel egregious in itself, but taken together, the persistence and prevalence of these characterizations speak volumes. One antidote is to read books by Black authors that feature Black women and girls in the fullness of their humanity.
Nonfiction is a natural place to start. Disability Visibility (Adapted for Young Adults): 17 First-Person Stories for Today, edited by Alice Wong (Delacorte, Oct. 26), and Wild Tongues Can't Be Tamed: 15 Voices From the Latinx Diaspora, edited by Saraciea J. Fennell (Flatiron Books, Nov. 2), are superlative collections of personal stories by a broad range of contributors. In each of these books Black women share nuanced and thoughtful reflections on their lives—about navigating the many ways there are to be Black and Latina or making an impact as a Black woman with disabilities.
Two very different novels reflect on the experiences of daughters of immigrants. In the vividly poetic Home Is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo (Make Me a World, March 2), 14-year-old Sudanese American Nima copes with curiosity about her family history, Islamophobia at school, and distance from her mother and best friend. A Catholic school senior with highly protective Haitian immigrant parents grapples with the pressure to excel and follow the straight and narrow path in Simone Breaks All the Rules (Scholastic, June 1), Debbie Rigaud’s charming, layered coming-of-age story.
Magical worlds can be a creative way to express pointed social commentary, as is the case with two powerful, relevant works: A Chorus Rises by Bethany C. Morrow (Tor Teen, June 1), the follow-up to 2020’s A Song Below Water, and Bad Witch Burning by Jessica Lewis (Delacorte, Aug. 24). Morrow’s novel takes on social media, privilege, sisterhood, feminism, and the responsibilities that come with influence. Lewis uses her protagonist’s supernatural powers to highlight issues of poverty, food insecurity, domestic violence, and a fraught mother-daughter relationship.
Laura Simeon is a young readers’ editor.
