Many know Stacey Abrams as a lawyer, entrepreneur, political leader, and voting rights advocate. In addition to serving in the Georgia House of Representatives for over a decade, she was the first African American woman to receive a major party’s nomination for governor when she ran in Georgia’s gubernatorial election in 2018. But Abrams is also a New York Times bestselling author who has penned 17 books.
The author stopped in St. Louis on her book tour to discuss her latest novel, a thriller entitled, “Coded Justice.”
It’s the third in a series which centers on Avery Keene. She is a former Supreme Court clerk who goes on quests to get to the bottom of cracks in government – and society.
For “Coded Justice,” she ventures into the world of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to examine a system intended to transform health care for veterans.
“One of the challenges of serving a veteran population is the absolute diversity of veteran needs,” Abrams said. “And it is also one of the things we do worst as a country.”
A well-intentioned former officer leans on AI technology as his firm works to build a framework for effective veteran healthcare.
“Things go horribly wrong,” Abrams said. “And so [in the book] we have to figure out why people are dying – who did it, or what did it.”
Abrams addressed a full auditorium at Clayton High School about her book on Tuesday night. The program was sponsored by Left Bank Books and The Left Bank Books Foundation. In a conversation with LaParis Hawkins, CEO and founder of Tailored Pieces – and founder of Books and Bonnets Book Club – she discussed how the literary thriller examines areas of social justice and in part, mirrors the current erosion of American democracy.
Abrams opened up the discussion by describing her family that included her five siblings and her mother and father, who is dyslexic and didn’t learn to read until his 30s. That detail is significant because her father used to tell Abrams and her siblings stories every Friday – stories that were composed of contributions from the children that he memorized and shaped into a weekly updated tale.
For Abrams’ mother, reading was her “escape from a tumultuous childhood” of being raised in Mississippi during Jim Crow. Stories and books were important for both of Abrams’ parents. Their love of the written and spoken word was part of what motivated Abrams to become a storyteller as well.
“I love writing and all genres … I wrote plays, I wrote poetry,” said Abrams. “I had a brief stint as a country music writer … but I just loved the art of that.”
Abrams described her foray into publishing her books, which began during her third year at Yale Law School. She told the audience her debut was a spy novel in the late 90s. The book was met with pushback from publishers who didn’t think that type of work from a Black woman would sell. But Abrams prevailed and published her first book, a romance novel, “Rules of Engagement” under the pen name, Selena Montgomery.
In discussing her current novel, Abrams explained she wanted to make the concept of AI “accessible.” She even took a course at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to fully understand the subject in order to relay it accurately.
In her description of how AI is used in the plot of the book, she mapped out how the technology relates to the intentions of the current administration regarding algorithmic bias (when technology is programmed to include biases in its structure and therefore function demonstrated in the recent defect of the social media platform, “X”).
Abrams gave the audience the example that regarding prostate cancer, Black men’s PSA (Prostate-Specific Antigen) levels rise faster than white men’s – and explained that there will be an executive order preventing programmers from creating code that will allow AI to produce that information.
The event was not only entertaining as Abrams imparted her quick wit but also informative when the talk included prior submitted questions from attendees.
She was asked if she’d ever run for another political office but provided no clear answer. Abrams also encouraged young people to run for office pointing out the challenges, particularly with a loss, but said the participation in the process is worthwhile and that finding the issues that matter should be one’s guidepost.
Abrams assured the audience that though democracy is in jeopardy it has not vanished.
“Yes, we can save democracy,” Abrams said. “Democracy is not dead, but it is endangered.” According to her, one of the dangers is in the belief that the nation is invulnerable to autocracy.
“We keep thinking we are, but Turkey was a democracy before it fell to Erdoğan (Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is Turkey’s autocratic leader),” Abrams said.
The encouragement and assurance from Abrams were bright spots in difficult times. But in addition to emotional solace, many people were curious about what tangible actions can be taken to combat the 10 steps to autocracy she laid out on her Instagram page and during an appearance on the ABC late-night talk show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” earlier this month, with guest host Anthony Anderson.
Abrams told The St. Louis American in an exclusive statement that, “Leadership at the state level and grassroots organizing are essential to rebuilding our democracy.
“We need the same long-haul commitment and optimism to fight back now. Democracy must deliver – and that means investing in local power, listening to communities, and scaling those efforts nationally – no matter how long it takes or how difficult it seems.”
Wendy Todd is a Report For America Corps Member with The St. Louis American.