IT WAS THE WAY SHE SAID IT

The best part of reading this entertaining collection of published and unpublished fiction, sketches, and nonfiction is the sheer delight of immersing yourself in the works of a writer who has plenty to say and has never been afraid to say it.

Author of 1990s megahits like Waiting To Exhale and How Stella Got Her Groove Back, McMillan has been chronicling the hopes, dreams, and defiance of Black women for decades, examining relationships between men and women, friends, neighbors, and family with hard-won wisdom and a rebellious authenticity. In these stories, economic woes figure prominently in the lives of her characters. Most of the protagonists are women, but in “The End,” published in 1976, a weary worker at the Ford Motor Co. confronts his dull days and the myriad factors that trap and isolate him. In “Reconstruction,” a man loses his job, and a couple’s relationship deteriorates into physical violence and sexual abuse. In “Ma’Dear (for Estelle Ragsdale),” a scrappy elderly widow survives by taking in boarders she’s not supposed to have. There are also characters struggling with love and its fallout—pregnancy scares, anger, regret, loneliness and loss—proving that McMillan has never shied away from frank assessments of sex and its power. In one of the best stories, “Can’t Close My Eyes to It,” a young girl spends time with her beloved grandmother and learns hard lessons about life. Even McMillan’s quick sketches are so immediately absorbing that you wish she’d fleshed them out into full-blown stories. You won’t want to skip the nonfiction pieces, which range from essays to a commencement speech, because the author’s voice is always engaging. But it’s through her fiction that McMillan shines brightest. “She reads the times we’re living through,” author Ishmael Reed writes in the foreword, a truth evident on every page.

An entertaining reminder of McMillan’s storytelling abilities and unflinching honesty.