A color Kodachrome portrait photograph taken by Carl Van Vechten showing author Zora Neale Hurston on July 18, 1946. Captured in a close-up portrait against a rich red backdrop, Hurston smiles warmly toward the right of the frame, casting a strong shadow behind her. She wears an off-white cream garment adorned with beaded trim at the collar and shoulders, multi-strand beaded necklaces, and a light-colored bonnet tied beneath her chin with an embellished, jewel-toned netted overlay across her dark hair. — Kodachrome image of Zora Neale Hurston on July 18, 1946. Credit: Carl Van Vechten / Carl Van Vechten, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Since its publication nearly 90 years ago, Zora Neale Hurston’s novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” has faced opposition. It’s still the ire of parents who’ve pushed for its ban in counties across the U.S. and Florida.

More than a Black feminist classic, the 1937 work is simply human and tells the story of a voiceless girl trying to forge a path for herself—with a stop in the Everglades along the way.

Book club members who head to Tampa’s Encore! district this week will discuss the book written in just seven weeks, and how “Hurston’s use of regional dialect, folklore and interior reflection helped reshape American literature…”

There’s no cover for the Black History Book Club meeting happening Monday, Aug. 31 at Tampa’s Black History Museum.