Books to Read If You Loved the Movie Sinners
By the time I saw Ryan Coogler’s Sinners last week, it felt like I was already behind. The movie seemed to take hold of moviegoers’ attention as soon as it was released—though this didn’t come without a bit of oddly disparaging framing by certain outlets. Still, the movie has been on everyone’s minds, with many people reporting seeing it two or three times in theaters. Unsurprisingly, this also means there have been a number of think pieces and, yes, book lists. I tried my best to avoid these before seeing the movie myself so that I could form my own opinion.
I have to say that, even with its more extravagant and fantastical elements, I was able to slip into a familiarity that I later realized was courtesy of my southern upbringing, despite not having lived in the region for more than 10 years. I’ve gathered a group of books that each touch on the major themes and feelings in Sinners. They are, at times, grotesque, celebratory, ancestral, and spiritual—all evocative of the South.
The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle
Tonally, this novella fits the overall feeling of Sinners the best of all the books in this list. It is a retelling of H.P. Lovecraft’s existential horror story The Horror at Red Hook, and is, in many ways, a reclaiming. Lovecraft was a raging racist (even for his time) who was influenced by Black people just as he despised us, and it’s kind of ironic (but also maybe just typical) that the same cosmic horror Lovecraft became known for explores exactly the same kind of all-encompassing existential dread that Black Americans have felt for hundreds of years in this land.
The Delectable Negro: Human Consumption and Homoeroticism within US Slave Culture by Vincent Woodard
By this time, even if you haven’t seen the movie, you may have surmised that vampires are used as a metaphor for the (sometimes literal) consumption of Black bodies in the name of Someone’s collective gain. Those Someones not being Black, obviously. In Woodard’s Lambda Award-winning book, enslaved people’s claims of consumption are given credence. He connects cannibalism, homoeroticism, and the culture of consumption always needed to feed the beast that is colonialism.
All Access members read on for more books to read if you loved Sinners
The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones
The release of this book being so close to Sinners is too perfect. It also has vampirism as an analogy of European violence against Indigenous and non-white populations, but this time, one of the brown bodies it consumes bites back.
Conjure Women by Afia Atakora
This historical fiction that follows a mother-daughter duo using their abilities to heal their community in the South before and after the Civil War offers a more concentrated look into the hoodoo that Annie in Sinners practiced, which was a huge plotpoint in the movie.
Brother Robert: Growing Up with Robert Johnson by Annye C. Anderson with Preston Lauterbach
Sinners was largely inspired by Robert Johnson, who was said to have sold his soul to the devil at the crossroads for a successful musical career. Well, Brother Robert is a memoir by Johnson’s actual stepsister, Anderson, that sets the record straight.
Abbott by Saladin Ahmed, Sami Kivelä (Illustrator), Jason Wordie (Colorist)
Here, a Black female reporter in ’70s Detroit starts investigating a series of grotesque killings that she just knows are connected somehow. I don’t want to spoil things too much, just know that once you read this comic, you’ll see the connection to Sinners.
There are, as with any other creative endeavor, many ways to interpret Sinners, and therefore many other books the movie can be likened to. Here are a couple of the aforementioned lists I read before compiling my own, just to make sure I said something new: 19 Books Like Ryan Coogler’s Vampire Horror Film; Sinners – A Reading and Resource List.
