How Black Books Lit My Way Along The Appalachian Trail

Eritrean-American essayist and short story writer Rahawa Haile writes about hiking the Appalachian Trail and traveling through trail towns as a black woman alone. She brings along books by black authors and leaves them behind for others to find at shelters along the way. In keeping with her 2015 Short Story of the Day effort to garner exposure for underrepresented writers, she writes, “This year, I created a library of black excellence along the Appalachian Trail.”