Litquake on Lockdown and MoAD present

Wayétu Moore and The Dragons, The Giant, The Women

‍When Wayétu Moore turns five years old, her father and grandmother throw her a big birthday party at their home in Monrovia, Liberia, but all she can think about is how much she misses her mother, who is working and studying in faraway New York. Before she gets the reunion her father promised her, war breaks out in Liberia. The family is forced to flee their home on foot, walking and hiding for three weeks until they arrive in the village of Lai.

Finally, a rebel soldier smuggles them across the border to Sierra Leone, reuniting the family and setting them off on yet another journey, this time to the United States.

Spanning this harrowing journey in Moore’s early childhood, her years adjusting to life in Texas as a black woman and an immigrant, and her eventual return to Liberia, The Dragons, the Giant, the Women is a deeply moving story of the search for home in the midst of upheaval. Moore has a novelist’s eye for suspense and emotional depth, and this unforgettable memoir is full of imaginative, lyrical flights and lush prose.

In capturing both the hazy magic and stark realities of what is becoming an increasingly pervasive experience, Moore shines a light on the great political and personal forces that continue to affect many migrants around the world, and calls us all to acknowledge the tenacious power of love and family. Wayétu will be in conversation with author and professor Faith Adiele.

Wayétu Moore is the author of She Would Be King, released by Graywolf Press in September, 2018. Her memoir, The Dragons, The Giant, The Women will also be released with Graywolf on June 2, 2020. She is the recipient of the 2019 Lannan Literary Fellowship for Fiction.

She Would Be King was named a best book of 2018 by Publishers Weekly, Booklist, Entertainment Weekly & BuzzFeed. The novel was a Sarah Jessica Parker Book Club selection, a BEA Buzz Panel Book, a #1 Indie Next Pick and a finalist for the Hurston/Wright Award.

Moore is the founder of One Moore Book, a non-profit organization that creates and distributes culturally relevant books for underrepresented readers. Her first bookstore opened in Monrovia, Liberia in 2015.Her writing can be found in The New York Times, The Paris Review, Frieze Magazine, Guernica, The Atlantic Magazine and other publications.  She has been featured in The Economist Magazine, NPR and Vogue Magazine, among others, for her work in advocacy for diverse children’s literature.

She’s a graduate of Howard University, University of Southern California and Columbia University.

Faith Adiele’s work includes The Nigerian Nordic Girl’s Guide to Lady Problems; Meeting Faith, a memoir about becoming Thailand’s first Black Buddhist nun; My Journey Home, a PBS documentary about finding family in Nigeria; and Coming of Age Around the World: A Multicultural Anthology. As Core Faculty of VONA/Voices, she founded the nation’s first workshop for travel writers of color.

She teaches at California College of the Arts and belongs to the San Francisco Writers Grotto, a community of working writers and narrative artists, and The Ruby, a work and gathering space for female creatives. Faith lives in Oakland, California and facilitates The African Book Club monthly at MoAD.

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