American · b. 1963
Charmaine Wilkerson was a journalist and professor before publishing her debut novel at fifty-nine. Black Cake (2022) spans decades and continents—from 1960s Caribbean to contemporary California—telling the story of a mother's secrets revealed posthumously to her estranged children. The novel became a word-of-mouth sensation, a Reese's Book Club pick, and was adapted for Hulu. Wilkerson, who is American with Caribbean roots, drew on family history and her years living abroad. She brings a journalist's eye for research and a dramatist's sense of revelation to multigenerational storytelling.