Dune Fan? Thank Philadelphia

The weird story of how our weird city played a crucial role in launching the sci-fi blockbuster, now officially on its third film

By Christina Griffith

Listen: Ali Velshi Banned Book Club reads Hunger by Roxane Gay

The MSNBC host and Citizen board member talks with Roxane Gay about her memoir Hunger, her raw story about being a Black woman in a big body in America

By Ali Velshi

The Citizen Recommends: The Sicilian Inheritance

In her new Philly novel, bestselling author and podcaster Jo Piazza explores a century-old murder, women’s strengths — and her own unresolved family mystery. Then, she turned it into a true crime podcast

By Olivia Kram

Listen: Ali Velshi Banned Book Club — Black Stories in Philadelphia

The MSNBC host and Citizen board member talks to fellow Citizen board member Angela Val, Visit Philly CEO, about making Philly the epicenter for resisting book bans through the use of "Little Freedom Libraries"

By Ali Velshi

Sentences for the Sentenced

West Philly non-profit Books Through Bars has provided the incarcerated with books for more than 30 years. Now, with growing inaccessibility, its work is needed more than ever

By Norah Rami

Erasure and the Fiction of America

What Zora Neale Hurston, Oscar-nominated American Fiction, and the sacrifice of Black women tell us about America on the cusp of Black History and Women’s History months

By James Peterson

Listen: Ali Velshi Banned Book Club on The ABCs of Book Banning

The MSNBC host and Citizen board member interviews 101-year-old book activist Grace Linn and George M. Johnson, author of All Boys Aren't Blue

By Ali Velshi

Books: “Black History in the Philadelphia Landscape: Deep Roots, Continuing Legacy”

A veteran Philadelphia social studies teacher wrote a new book about Black Philadelphia history. Here, an excerpt from a chapter featuring Washington, aka Congo, Square

By Amy Jane Cohen