Radiant Summer 2025 Reading List
From newly released books to the tried and true, our summer reading list has something for everyone.
The Big We
Hali Lee
Drawing from experiences of real life giving circles, Hali Lee (WOC National Advisory Committee and 2022 Award for Excellence winner) challenges our traditional understanding of philanthropy and makes her case for the power of giving and the radically simple idea that when we work together, we have the power to make the world a better place.
Someone’s Gotta Give
Alisha Fernandez Miranda
The author of What If My Year is back with a fun, witty debut novel that takes you inside the world of extreme wealth and charitable giving. Lucia thought she had it all figured out—until life in London as a new mom and expat turning everything upside down. She’s barely holding it together when she unexpectedly lands a glamorous job as a philanthropic advisor at London’s poshest private bank. But is the world of the uber-wealthy everything that it’s cracked up to be?
Carla’s Comfort Foods: Favorite Dishes from Around the World
Chef Carla Hall
This book may have premiered a decade ago but it’s a true and true favorite. Featuring 130 recipes with new variations on soulful favorites, this cookbook covers the culinary globe on an ingenious, delicious mission: to capture the international flavors of comfort. For Carla Hall, co-host of The Chew, food is a wonderful way to forge connections with and between people. In her delicious cookbook, Carla’s Comfort Foods, she finds inspiration by going around the world in search of the universal home-cooked flavors of comfort.
Crowns: Portraits of Black Women in Church Hats
Michael Cunningham and Craig Marberry
Another classic book, we wanted to draw attention to it for those who may not have heard of it. You may not “read” it per se, but you can enjoy seeing the beautiful images.
For countless Black women, a church hat, flamboyant as it may be, is no mere fashion accessory; it’s a cherish African American custom, one cherished with boundless passion.
A woman’s hat speaks long before the wearer utters a word. It’s what Deirdre Guion calls, “hattitiude…there’s a little more strut in your carriage when you wear a nice hat.” If a hat says a lot about a person, it says even more about a people—the customs they observe, the symbols they prize, and the fashions they fancy.
Women of Color in Fundraising and Philanthropy (WOC)® receives no commissions through our reading list.
