I have a number of books in other languages—aspirational books for when my language skills improve enough to be able to read them. I’m particularly k… - Sarah Ladipo Manyika

Oh, there are so many! When I think of feature films, I imagine the intense drama of Nawal El Saadawi’s Woman at Point Zero; the quiet grief, as well as the eroticism of Yewande Omotoso’s An Unusual Grief; the forbidden wartime love story of Chinelo Okparanta’s Under the Udala Trees. Short stories such as Segun Afolabi’s ‘Monday Morning’ would also make for powerful and timely feature length films.

Thanks to my character, I too have begun to group my books in non-traditional ways. Thus far, my groupings, unlike Morayo’s, have been less about characters talking to each other and more about pairing authors. For example, I have Marilynne Robinson and Toni Morrison’s Home’s next to each other as well as God Help the Child next to Lila as there are thematic similarities in both pairings.

Whenever I can’t find stories that I want to read, I try writing them for myself. In this case, I’d met many older women who’d lived colorful lives and yet when it came to fiction, I didn’t find stories that mirrored these lives, especially so when it came to the lives of Black women.