Our Story

Hi!

We’re an intimate group of (mostly) thirty-something Black women in LA!

Our origin story goes something like this—

In July 2021, a DC transplant asks an open-ended question in an LA Facebook group for Black women:

“Would anyone be interested in joining a book club?”

In August 2021, we met on Zoom for the first time and that’s really the history of us.

Over the years, we’ve read some pretty interesting books — some good, some not quite our taste.

We didn’t start reading BIPOC authors exclusively until our second year, but switched it up once we realized the impact that has in the publishing industry and the communities that champion them.

Sometimes we choose a book and don’t finish it by the meeting.

We’ve swapped members like Destiny’s Child and switched up our meeting platform too.

We’ve cried and laughed with each other at all of the life events you can think of.

We’ve disagreed and gotten on each other’s nerves and then called each other at odd hours because, despite all of that, we knew that one of us would always answer.

We’ve fallen in love with Tia Williams and Kennedy Ryan over and over again and opened our hearts to new BIPOC authors over the years.

We’ve hated characters and fought over what makes a good book boyfriend.

And so much more.

In summer 2026 will be celebrating FIVE years of Baddies + Books. That’s a hard thing to do in LA— make something last. Make something with women last. Make something with Black women last. (You get it.)

We meet in person for book club meetings and plan “member’s only events” (we call those side quests). If you are in LA and want to attend, join our Substack membership! If you happen to be a Baddie outside of the city limits, this membership will also give you access to exclusive conversations about book picks and chatting with some of our favorite authors this year, so our remote Baddies are welcome to still join!