#10BeforeTheEnd Book List: Demetrius Frazier

November 3, 2025

Resist Booksellers Owner Demetrius Frazier likes a good trend as much as anyone! As part of the bookish trend #10beforetheend where readers collect a list of 10 books they intend to read before the end of the year, Demetrius has curated a list of ten compelling books that address power, identity, resistance and the futures we’re fighting to build. These titles aren’t just books. They’re conversations, catalysts, manifests of possibility. Below is a walkthrough of each pick and why it matters.

The Scammer by Tiffany D. Jackson
Jackson is a New York Times bestselling and award-winning author whose YA work tackles tough themes with unflinching honesty.
This pick signals an embrace of intersectional storytelling—where youth, race, trauma and cunning intersect.
Author website: tiffanydjackson.com
Star Wars: Sanctuary by Lamar Giles
Giles is a multi-genre writer, comfortable in young adult thrillers and intergalactic space sagas, and a founding member of We Need Diverse Books.
Including this title signals that resistance also lives in the imaginative, in new worlds, in genre.
Author website: lamargiles.com
Black Power Scorecard by Andre M. Perry
Perry, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, is deeply engaged in research around racial inequality, economics and community uplift. Demetrius had a chance to meet Andre at the most recent Blck Street Summit by The Jackson Ward Collective. Buddy read with PT employee and english professor at Virginia State University.
This title emphasizes structural critique—examining power and capital through a racial lens.
Author profile: brookings.edu/people/andre-m-perry
Black Capitalists by Rachel Laryea
Laryea’s work explores Black participation in capitalist economies, offering an ethnographic lens on wealth, power, and transformation. Buddy read with friend and colleague.
In the Resist context this is about rewriting what capital means and for whom.
Author website: rachellaryea.com
Reel by Kennedy Ryan
Ryan is a bestselling romance novelist whose narratives push representation, joy, and agency.
This selection serves as a reminder that resistance isn’t only in protest—it can be in love, in pleasure, in reclaiming narrative space. January Book Club Pick for Black Men Read!
Author website: kennedyryanwrites.com
Harmattan Season by Tochi Onyebuchi
Onyebuchi is a writer whose speculative fiction engages Afrofuturist themes and new possibilities.
For Resist, this is about imagining what’s next—how to build beyond the systems we have.
Author website: tochionyebuchi.com
Dominion by Addie E. Citchens
Citchens’s debut situates Black Southern family drama and carries a powerful sense of place and legacy.
This choice affirms regional stories, familial inheritance and resilience.
Author profile: Addie E. Citchens
Blood Slaves by Markus Redmond
Redmond, actor-director-writer, moves into novel territory with this supernatural thriller.
Including this signals that resistance can embrace genre, myth, horror and the fantastical as well as the real.
Author profile: Markus Redmond
The Between by Tananarive Due
Due is an award-winning author and educator whose work spans horror, Afrofuturism and Black speculative fiction.
This title underscores the “inbetween” spaces—the liminal zones of society and identity where so much of resistance happens.
Author website: tananarivedue.com
The Great Mann by Kyra Davis Lurie
Lurie is a New York Times bestselling author whose historical fiction here dives into post-war Black Los Angeles elite and its tensions.
This pick highlights hidden histories, wealth, class, race and how they intersect in American life.
Author website: kyradavislurie.com