The Black Book Bash will bring more than 100 authors to Jacksonville. Deesha Philyaw, author of "The Secret Lives of Church Ladies," is a Jacksonville native who is slated to attend. | Will Brown, Jacksonville Today
Published on October 2, 2025 at 3:35 pm
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This weekend’s Black Book Bash may be an antidote to the antagonistic position policymakers and some publishers show toward Black authors and stories.
The inaugural festival will bring more than 150 authors to Jacksonville for three days of connection with literary consumers, community among authors and conversation about the state of the publishing industry.
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Making an influence in book sales
Jacksonville resident Casey R. Kelley created the Black Book Bash. She expects the event will draw nearly 2,000 authors, book influencers, visitors and attendees to Downtown.
Kelley founded the Casey Kelley Media Agency last year. She created the firm to connect authors, publishers and influencers, in an attempt to spur Black literary arts, during a time when Black intellectualism in the United States is under critique.
“We’re going to be solely focused on making sure that people understand the importance of reading diversely — not just reading diversely from a race, gender, culture perspective — but, reading diversely across genres,” Kelley says.
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People who do not have a ticket to the Black Book Bash can still purchase books from the vendor marketplace that will take place inside the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
America’s banned book capital
Kelley stated she wanted to hold the event after Labor Day and before homecoming season. That the Black Book Bash begins 48 hours after PEN America spotlighted Florida as the country’s banned book capital is happenstance.
PEN America is a nonprofit dedicated to literature and human rights. In a report released Wednesday, PEN America noted books that are removed from classrooms overwhelmingly explore themes like race and racism; gender identity; human sexuality; or sexual violence. It argues the chilling effect is more than an attack on freedom of speech; it further erodes American democracy.
“Now, more than ever, we need opportunities to share these stories,” Deesha Philyaw says. “It’s specifically because the history of Black folks and queer folks are targeted.”
Philyaw grew up in Jacksonville’s Sugar Hill neighborhood, graduated from Stanton College Prep and spent more than one summer afternoon reading on the floor of the Haydon Burns Library. She is also the author of The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, a critically acclaimed collection of short stories that earned the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction and was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction.
“Narratives have power. There are false narratives that were used to justify our enslavement and the brutality and rape that was done to our enslaved ancestors,” Philyaw adds. “It was all rooted in a story that we weren’t human, the (belief) that we were beasts of burden, the (belief) that Black women were beasts and unrapeable. Stories have power. That’s why when we tell stories that affirm and celebrate our stories, those stories are a threat.”
There’s no place like home
Philyaw says she is excited to return home to participate in the Black Book Bash. Jacksonville is the city that has served as the inspiration or backdrop for many of her stories.
The challenge authors like Philyaw have faced is getting their work into the hands and eyes of the masses.
Social media has also allowed authors to connect with their audience as well as for booklovers to share recommendations of their own, outside of affirmations from the New York Times or USA Today bestseller lists.
Kelley says influencers have stepped into the gap. She, as well as her peers, cultivated the Essence Fest Authors Stage in 2023 and 2024.
The Black Book Bash is far from the only book festival held in the River City. The Jacksonville Book Fest was held over two weekends last month. The Jax By Jax Literary Arts Festival will take place Nov. 8 and Nov. 9 at the Jacksonville Public Library. The Jax Urban Book Festival will be held at James Weldon Johnson Park on Jan. 24.
Jacksonville author Nikesha Elise Williams says adding the Black Book Bash compliments those other events. Williams says Florida may not have the deepest literary reputation, but the peninsula has been home to Zora Neale Hurston. Meanwhile, Jacksonville has literary luminaries like Philyaw, Dawnie Walton and Dantiel Moniz.
“The Black Book Bash being held in Florida is both protest and notice that despite what Republican administrations and regimes try to do at the local, state and federal levels, our voices, our stories and our experiences will not be silenced or censored,” Williams says. “Whether we write about love, family, trauma, politics, LGBTQIA+ rights or anything else we dream up or imagine.”
Williams’ eighth book The Seven Daughters of Dupree, will be released in January. She praised Kelley’s ability to conjure the family reunion for Black literati, and her ability to bring it to Jacksonville.
Author’s showcase
Helena Haywoode Henry has not spent as much time in Jacksonville as Philyaw and Williams. But, like the two Jaxsons, she became an author after exploring another career and experiencing motherhood.
Henry is a North Carolina-based author who will speak at the Black Book Bash on Friday afternoon.
Henry’s debut book, Last Chance LIVE!, will be released Oct. 7. It’s a young adult novel about a young woman on death row who competes in a reality show with the hope of winning her freedom.
“I wrote Last Chance LIVE! to offer readers of all backgrounds a framework of how to think critically about different issues, but not what to think,” Henry says.
“I think consumers exist in an ecosystem where our infotainment tells us what to think and our political parties tell us what to think. There’s really a lot of outsourcing of individual analysis that goes on. My hope is that Last Chance LIVE! (will help) focus readers in on questions about our individual, existential, circumstances and questions about society and (have them) them to process for themselves where they think the problems are and what they think the solutions are.”
Henry notes the ease of information accessible through the Internet and artificial intelligence have the potential to replace one’s ability to research, think for themselves and identify their place in society.
Henry’s experience as a corporate attorney made her familiar with a 2018 resolution from the American Bar Association that encouraged jurisdictions with the death penalty to prohibit capital punishment on perpetrators who are under 21.
Henry said her lived experience allowed her to tell a richer story. It’s a sentiment Philyaw echoed. Philyaw was a consultant and educator before she became an author.
Philyaw’s novel The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman will be released in 2026. Because arts funding at all levels of government is not as stable as it once was, Philyaw says authors need people of conscience to purchase books and support book sellers.
“We are writing about love,” Philyaw says. “We are writing about grandmothers. We are writing about betrayal. We are writing about religious dogma. We are writing about mothers and fathers. We are writing about families. All of those things people can relate to. People who are not Black can choose to access those stories.”
