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In today's episode of the podcast, we’re going to be tapping into a popular romance book, Before I Let Go by Kennedy Ryan. 

Before I Let Go by Kennedy Ryan is a dual-POV, second chance romance that tells the story of Yasmen and Josiah Wade. Yasmen and Josiah were in a deeply loving relationship with two children and dreams of creating and nurturing a booming restaurant, when two devastating back-to-back losses hit the couple. Unable to navigate the strain the losses brought to her and their marriage, Yasmen asks for a divorce. Now a couple of years down the line, with her life starting to get back on track, Yasmen and Josiah coexist as co-parents to their children while juggling a thriving restaurant together.

With feelings bubbling beneath the surface, however, Yasmen and Josiah must confront if they’re truly capable of letting go and moving on from their relationship when a stolen kiss between the couple leads to an illicit affair that opens old wounds. 

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In today’s episode, we’re leaning back into my bread n butter - literary fiction - with Onyi Nwabineli’s debut novel, Someday, Maybe.

Someday, Maybe is a literary fiction novel about a young woman, named Eve’s, journey through grief after her husband commits suicide - her being the one who finds him. The novel introduces you to Eve’s family and friends as she struggles living underneath the weight of her loss and the means the loss came about. 

Someday, Maybe is a novel layered with themes of loss and self-worth, that dissects the complexities of grief and untangles how people, like Eve, can idolize or canonize those who have passed as they memorialize them. In the novel, Eve’s idolization of her husband blinds her to the complexities of who he is as a person, their relationship, and working through her grief.

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For today's episode, we're back with another reading wrap up, this time looking at some YA Mystery reads. 

Books covered in this episode:
1) Monday's Not Coming by Tiffany D. Jackson
2) Cherish Farrah by Bethany C. Morrow 
3) Where Sleeping Girls Lie by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
4) Delicious Monsters by Liselle Sambury

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Welcome back to another episode of Flip the Page! 

In this episode, we're going to be discussing black hockey romance books (never thought I'd see the day); specifically, two books from Deanna Grey's Mendell Hawks series, Sunny Disposition and Team Players. Plug in and see if hockey romance lovers deserve rights.

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Annnd she's back with another episode of Flip the Page. This week, we're gonna be tapping into Rootless by Krystle Zara Appiah.

Rootless is a literary fiction novel about societal pressures, motherhood, and sacrifice. Efe and Sam are the main characters who met in their teens entering university. After flirting around their attraction and connection, Efe and Sam eventually get together. Efe is someone who has always struggled under the overbearing pressure of her parent’s expectations and determining what she truly wants to do. She finds comfort in Sam, who on the flip side is stable in his career and has a clear vision of his and their future. Unfortunately down the line, Efe realizes the future Sam has mapped out for them is not one she wants. 

Cue an unplanned pregnancy entering the chat. Sam wants to keep the baby. Efe, who has just grasped her dreams career-wise for the first time, does not. Finding the idea of motherhood suffocating and her dreams slipping from her hands, Efe disappears.

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Hey y'all, welcome back to another episode Flip the Page. I'm doing things a lil different in this episode and bringing y'all a reading wrap up of the books that launched me into the worst reading slump I've experienced in years. Featuring (mostly) romance books. 

Books covered in this episode:
1) Curvy Girl Summer by Danielle Allen
2) Sweetness in the Skin by Ishi Robinson
3) Can't Let Her Go by Kianna Alexander
4) Saavy Sheldon Feels Good As Hell by Taj McCoy

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After a likkle hiatus, we're back with another episode of Flip of Page. Today we're going to be talking about Unplanned by Natalie K. Martin.

Unplanned is an adult contemporary fiction novel that tells the story of 38-year-old Zoe, whose been traveling the world for the past 11-years with her long-time boyfriend, Sam and currently settled down in Australia. When Zoe suddenly learns she’s pregnant, Sam’s disinterest in a child has her reevaluating the compromises and choices she’s made in her relationship and life. Choosing to separate herself from Sam, Zoe returns home to London. When her best friend challenges her to create a pre-baby bucket list, Zoe is forced to look at her life from a different perspective as she strives to determine what she really wants and whether that “want” includes a man or not.

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We're back with another episode of Flip the Page. On the menu for today is a historical fantasy novel, Masquerade by O.O. Sangoyomi. We'll be discussing love, power and power dynamics.

Masquerade is a historical fantasy novel set in a reimagined 15th century West Africa, loosely based on the myth of Persephone. Òdòdó, the main character of the story, is a young woman born into and belonging to the blacksmith guild; a societal status marking Òdòdó, her mother and other women blacksmiths in the guild as social pariahs and outsiders. At the start of the novel, Òdòdó’s hometown, Timbuktu, has been conquered by the warrior king of Yorùbáland, only worsening the living conditions of her and the other blacksmiths.

A chance encounter with a vagrant outside her home leads to Òdòdó being abducted; stolen away to the capital city of Ṣàngótẹ̀, where she learns the man who orchestrated her kidnapping is the vagrant. The vagrant, being the warrior king, Àrèmọ. It isn’t long before Òdòdó learns Àrèmọ had taken her to make her his wife. 

Suddenly thrust into the upper echelon of society, Òdòdó touches power for the first time in her life. As dissension and tensions brew amongst the population, Òdòdó finds herself caught in political schemes, torn between her old life and new, risking everything she stands to gain from aligning herself with Àrèmọ.

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Welcome back to Flip the Page. Today's episode, we're getting a bit serious, delving into white supremacy and antiblackness through the concept of "rot" seen in Akwaeke Emezi's, Little Rot.

Little Rot weaves the story of five friends, through their point-of-views, as they each come into varying degrees of contact with the elite underbelly of a Nigerian city. Aima and Kalu are a long-time couple, who have just broken up. In despair, Kalu attends a sex party hosted by his best friend Ahmed. A single decision made by Kalu at the party sets off a chain reaction. Two sex workers, Ola and Souraya, visiting the city, find themselves suddenly flung into the chaos as they intersect with Ahmed and Kalu. In the face of evil, corruption, violence, loss, grief, murder and betrayal, Little Rot shows the lengths these five will go to save each other and themselves.

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Welcome back to Flip the Page. We're back with episode 11 of the pod, talking about Robbie Renee's 'Somebody's Wife', and y'all.. this is not what I want... this is not what I planned. I was so ready to get elbows deep in a good ole cheating trope, yet here we are instead, discussing colorism in literature...

Somebody's Wife centers around Dr. Jemma Holiday, a well-respected Black woman at her university. Jemma is married to her university sweetheart, Quinton. When they were younger, they were well-known in their school, Quinton being a top track athlete and Jemma coming from a well-respected legacy family. After they got together, Jemma became pregnant while in school. They kept the child and stayed together, with both sets of parents helping raise their daughter while they finished college. They got married and were very much in love for a few years, both currently employed in high positions at their alma mater. That is, until the sparks fizzled out, leaving Jemma stuck in an unloving marriage with a man who constantly cheated on her. When she meets Dr. Ezekiel Green, it’s love at first sight as passion erupts between the two. Suddenly, Jemma finds herself debating whether staying true to her marriage to maintain a facade of a happy marriage for their extended family and careers is worth it.

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