Natalie Baszile w/ Amber Flame

About this event

Writer, filmmaker, and author of Queen Sugar, Natalie Baszile, visits the store for her new novel, Friends and Family, a piercing examination of friendship and loyalty as two best friends find themselves at odds over their beliefs on race, identity and allyship, especially when it comes to their teenage children. She will be joined by poet, publisher, and musician Amber Flame. Registration is not required, but helps us anticipate audience size. If you'd like to RSVP, please do so here! Babs and Nora became friends thanks to their kids. Now, the desire to protect their children might tear them apart. Babs and Nora have spent a decade’s worth of morning walks sharing family secrets, local drama, and advice—everything from tips on lingerie choices to Babs’s suggestions to Nora, a white woman, on how to raise Nathan, her adopted Black son. But their worlds are turned upside down when the cops are called on their kids while they’re home alone, leading to a traumatic police encounter for Nathan. In the aftermath, Babs and Nora find themselves divided as never before, and Nathan looks for refuge with Babs and her family, where, unlike in his own home, race, identity, and culture are always up for discussion. Babs can see that Nathan is a young Black man without community trying to find himself. Torn between respecting Nora’s boundaries and embodying the values so important to her own family, Babs will make a choice that will shape their lives forever. Set in a tight-knit enclave in the Bay Area, Friends and Family is an eye-opening exploration of friendship and privilege, race and community, and what it means to truly be a good friend and ally. Natalie Baszile is a writer and filmmaker. Her debut novel, Queen Sugar, was named a Best Book of the Year by the San Francisco Chronicle, an NAACP Image Award nominee, and was the inspiration for the acclaimed television series co-produced by Ava DuVernay and Oprah Winfrey. Her non-fiction book, We Are Each Other’s Harvest: Celebrating African American Farmers, Land & Legacy was a Wall Street Journal Book of the Year. Natalie's non-fiction work has appeared in National Geographic, O, The Oprah Magazine, The Bitter Southerner, and numerous anthologies. Natalie has had residencies at the Ragdale Foundation, Virginia Center for the Arts, Hedgebrook, SFFILM and the Djerassi Resident Arts Program. Her short film “Black Girl in Paris” premiered at the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival. A native Californian, Natalie’s southern roots stem from Louisiana, South Carolina, and Alabama. She lives in the Bay Area. Amber Flame is a multi-genre writer and interdisciplinary artist garnering residencies with Baldwin for the Arts, Millay Arts, Vermont Studio Center, Hedgebrook, and more. Flame’s first collection of poetry, Ordinary Cruelty, published 2017 through Write Bloody Press. Flame’s second book, apocrifa, a love story told in verse, launched May 2023 from Red Hen Press, with a third collection forthcoming in fall 2027. Co-founder and Deputy Publisher of Generous Press, a romance house publishing Black and brown, queer, and disabled love stories, Amber Flame finds joy singing with a blues band, making art, and raising a talented kid in Tacoma, Washington.

Who

• Natalie BaszileAuthor
  Buy their bookMore events

The book

• Friends and FamilyNatalie Baszile

More by Natalie Baszile

• 
  We Are Each Other's HarvestNatalie BaszileBuy on Bookshop.org
• 
  Queen sugarNatalie BaszileBuy on Bookshop.org

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Venue

Comstock's Bindery & Bookshop

WA

Venue website

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