6 Books Published by Shamal Books on AALBC — Book Cover Collage

The lives and writings of six leading Black Buddhist women—Jan Willis, bell hooks, Zenju Earthlyn Manuel, angel Kyodo williams, Spring Washam, and Faith Adiele—reveal new expressions of Buddhism rooted in ancestry, love, and collective liberation.

Lifting as They Climb is a love letter of freedom and self-expression from six Black women Buddhist teachers, conveyed through the voice of author Toni Pressley-Sanon, one of the innumerable people who have benefitted from their wisdom. She explores their remarkable lives and undertakes deep readings of their work, weaving them into the broader tapestry of the African diaspora and the historical struggle for Black liberation.

Black women in the U.S. have adapted Buddhist practice to meet challenges ranging from the injustices of the Jim Crow South to sexual violence, social discrimination, and bias within their Buddhist communities. Using their voices through the practice of memoir and other forms of writing, they have not only realized their own liberation but carried forward the Black tradition of leading others on the path toward collective awakening.

From the back cover: "Often compared to Arthur A. Schomberg and Ramon Emeterio Betances, Louis Reyes Rivera is viewed as many as a bridge between our Pan-American African and Latino communities. With this third book of poetry, he demonstrates why he is called "The Janitor of History." Here is testament on behalf of the disinherited, an oration against the distortions of history; poetry at its finest. Every stanza and line singes with sound, sense, rhythm and color, agony and celebration. These 46 poems span 21 years of searching through the rubble of our own contradiction. His is not a bitter voice, though deep his poems cut through pain and hope and human capacity. Their intention: to confront our refusal to admit what we do to one another. Their mission: to advance the clearest definition of ourselves. Their aim: accurate and compelling."