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A kaleidoscopic account of the crack cocaine era and a community’s ultimate resilience—told through a cast of characters whose lives illuminate the dramatic rise and fall of the epidemic

The crack epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s is arguably the least examined crisis in American history. Beginning with the myths inspired by Reagan's war on drugs, journalist Donovan X. Ramsey's exacting work exposes the undeniable links between the last triumphs of the Civil Rights Movement and the consequences we live with today—a racist criminal justice system, continued mass incarceration and gentrification, and increased police brutality.

When Crack Was King follows four individuals to give us a startling portrait of crack’s destruction and devastating legacy. Elgin Swift, an archetype of American industry and ambition and son of a crack-addicted father who turned their home into a “crack house”; Lennie Woodley, a former crack addict and a sex worker; Kurt Schmoke, former mayor of Baltimore and an early advocate of decriminalization; and lastly, Shawn McCray, community activist, basketball prodigy, and a founding member of the Zoo Crew, Newark's most legendary group of drug traffickers. 

Weaving together riveting research with the voices of survivors, When Crack Was King is a crucial re-evaluation of the era and a powerful argument for providing historically violated communities with the resources they deserve.

Noteworthy Discoveries

• How the crack epidemic really began
• How both Democrats and Republicans failed urban America during the crack epidemic
• How Dr. Dre's The Chronic helped turn the page on the crack epidemic
• How young people of color ended the crack epidemic
• Why Joe Biden owes urban Americans an explanation for the crack epidemic
• Lessons from the crack epidemic for the opioid epidemic

This deluxe edition is printed with stenciled edges!

In this Southern gothic horror novel, four unlikely allies in a small town investigate a local teen's disappearance, and what they discover festering at the core of their community is far more sinister and ancient than they could’ve ever imagined. For fans of She is a Haunting, True Detective, Mexican Gothic, and Midsommar.

When Dawson Sumter goes missing, all he leaves behind is a smattering of blood in room 4 of the debt-ridden motel owned by Neera Singh's family. Disappearances like this aren't uncommon in the rural Georgia town of Carrion, especially every thirteen years when a periodical cicada brood returns from underground, shrieking their deafening screams.

For Neera, Dawson is another reminder that in this corner of the South, the rich only get richer, and the poor―well, nothing good comes their way.

Neera sets out to investigate Dawson’s whereabouts―if he even still lives―along with three other teens: Isaiah, son of a prominent judge and clandestine true crime podcaster; Reid, son of the wealthiest man in the region; and Sam, estranged daughter of the local hitman. As they find themselves entangled in a messy web of secrets and lies, they discover the riches of the adjacent Lake Clearwater community may have a terrifying source of power dating back to the town’s founding and an ancient urban legend about three devils, each more sinister than the next. How deep does the rot go, and can they find a way to escape its reach?

Now available in trade paper!

The power of faith intersects with the practicality of counseling in this unique partnership of a faith/worship leader and a therapist as they offer a pathway for readers to find help, hope, healing, and freedom while navigating life's struggles.

No one is immune from life's difficulties, yet many people are reluctant to talk about mental health or seek professional help when they are struggling. People of faith who are battling issues such as anxiety, depression, life changes, stress, or relationship problems may suffer in silence, believing things would get better if only their faith was stronger, they prayed more, or if they had more self-discipline. The stigma about needing to seek help is all too real. 

But seeking professional help isn't a sign of weakness; it's a sign that someone is serious about moving forward emotionally, relationally, and spiritually. Written by producer, artist, and author Anthony Evans, along with licensed psychotherapist Stacy Kaiser, When Faith Meets Therapy:

• Dispels the cultural myths and stigmas that surround professional therapy
• Shares stories from the authors' personal experiences and others who are facing life's challenges
• Provides practical steps that readers can take in the pursuit of emotional, relational, and spiritual progress

Anthony and Stacy met five years ago when Anthony was seeking emotional and relational healing of his own. Stacy led Anthony through his own process of internal renovation and remains his personal therapist to this day.

When Faith Meets Therapy contains priceless, practical knowledge to break stereotypes that surround therapy, all while offering immeasurable hope and encouragement.

A rare birthday. A second chance. A woman finally choosing herself.

Simone Harris has always known how to hold it down. For her son. For her clients. For the sports agency she built from scratch. She keeps things running, keeps herself moving, and keeps her heart tucked safely out of reach.

But this birthday feels different. It falls on a leap year, a date that only circles back every so often. A rare kind of day that feels like it arrives exactly when it’s meant to. The kind that makes you pause and ask what you have been pushing through just to keep going. In that stillness, something begins to surface alongside it. Fatigue. Questions. The quiet ache she has learned to ignore.

She is not falling apart. Still, something is shifting. The pressure she has lived under feels heavier than it once did. And as she begins to listen to what her spirit has been trying to say, the past reappears, bringing with it a familiar comfort, unfinished conversations, and a quiet invitation to feel again.

Invasive. Possessive. Assertive. Truce Wright is an ambitious man on a mission. Nothing in life is off limits to him. Whatever he wants, he gets….even if it’s someone else’s.

Displeased. Submissive. Captivating. Sanai Lee is a risk taker. Her boldness creates an exit for fear. What she didn’t know she needed comes in the form of a Truce.

What happens when you follow your heart and let him come over when your man is not there?

Welcome to Indigo Falls…

In When Home Is a Photograph, Leigh Raiford asks how Black people use photography to make home in the world. Raiford focuses on a selection of Black American activists and artists, including Marcus Garvey, James Van Der Zee, Eslanda Goode Robeson, and Kathleen Neal Cleaver to explore the complex relationship between racialized subjects and the medium of photography. As they traveled the world for study, for work, for pleasure, or for survival, these artists and activists took and collected photographs to express their political platforms and personal sense of self. Raiford considers the everyday image-making practices that these Black Americans employed to improve the condition of Black lives globally by imagining, identifying, inhabiting, leaving, defending, and destroying “home.” When Home Is a Photograph shows how these figures did not merely utilize photography to emplace themselves in the world—they demonstrated how the use of photography is itself a way to mediate one’s relationship to the world.

An ode to being active and to dramatic play, this inspiring picture book will inspure young readers to get moving and start imagining! Perfect for fans of Ruth Krauss’s I Can Fly and Ashley Spires’s The Most Magnificent Thing.
 
Simple, engaging rhymes will inspire little ones to jump, run, and explore the limitless possibilities of their imagination in this energizing ode to movement by award-winning author Carole Boston Weatherford.
 
When I Move is an energetic celebration of joy and exploration; perfect for little ones learning to navigate new experiences and friendships as they find their way in the world.

In this sweeping second chance romance from debut author Myah Ariel, the unexpected spark of two former flames may force them to choose between their dreams and each other. Kaliya Wilson has paid her dues. But all the years behind the reception desk at a flashy film studio have only pushed her movie-making dreams further out of reach. That is, until a surprise reunion presents an opportunity that could make her career, or break her heart…a second time. It’s been seven years since Kaliya’s whirlwind college romance with Danny Prescott went up in flames. While her passions have stalled, his career is taking off. So when the hot shot director reappears to offer her a job on his next production, it’s a shock to the system. Working with Danny may recapture the intensity of their film school days, but trusting him again won’t come as easily. As the pair allows themselves the openness and vulnerability to entrust their deepest truths to each other, the possibility of a true connection draws ever closer. But when Hollywood politics and scandal threaten to sink the production and her career, Kaliya may have to risk everything to do what’s right—even if it means letting go of the second chance love of a lifetime.

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A dynamic, moving hybrid work that celebrates Black youth, often too fleeting, and examines Black lives lost to police violence. 

In this astonishing volume of poems and lyric prose, Whiting Award–winner A. Van Jordan draws comparisons to Black characters in Shakespearean plays—Caliban and Sycorax from?The Tempest, Aaron the Moor from?Titus Andronicus, and the eponymous antihero of?Othello—to mourn the deaths of Black people, particularly Black children, at the hands of police officers. What do these characters, and the ways they are defined by the white figures who surround them, have in common with Tamir Rice, Trayvon Martin, and other Black people killed in the twenty-first century?

Balancing anger and grief with celebration, Jordan employs an elastic variety of poetic forms, including ekphrastic sestinas inspired by the photography of Malick Sidibé, fictional dialogues, and his signature definition poems that break down the insidious power of words like “fair,” “suspect,” and “juvenile.” He invents a new form of window poems, based on a characterization exercise, to see Shakespeare’s Black characters in three dimensions, and finds contemporary parallels in the way these characters are othered, rendered at once undesirable and hypersexualized, a threat and a joke.

At once a stunning inquiry into the roots of racist violence and a moving recognition of the joy of Black youth before the world takes hold, When I Waked, I Cried to Dream Again expresses the preciousness and precarity of life.

A group of girls does Death incarnate's bidding in this haunting speculative young adult novel by the author of The Year of the Witching.

Roslyn isn’t herself anymore. It’s been a year since her sister, Adeline, died under mysterious circumstances, and Roslyn is still tormented by her absence. So when the elusive caravan of girls that Adeline spent her last summer with rolls back into town, Roslyn joins them to finally figure out what happened to her sister.

Strange, beautiful, and intriguing, the girls are closed off from the world. And as it turns out, they’re brought together by a force more sinister than Roslyn’s nightmares could’ve conjured up: Death himself.

Death has spared the girls from untimely endings, and to pay for their lives, the girls travel the country reaping souls on his behalf. Now Roslyn must decide if finding closure is worth the price of striking the same deal.

Sydney Green is Brooklyn-born and raised, but the neighborhood she loves is being erased before her very eyes. FOR SALE signs are popping up everywhere, and the neighbors she’s known all her life are disappearing. To preserve the past, Sydney channels her frustration into a walking tour: “Displaced: A People’s History of Brooklyn,” and finds an unlikely and unwanted assistant in one of the new arrivals to the block – her neighbor Theo.

But Sydney and Theo’s deep dive into history quickly becomes a dizzying descent into paranoia and fear. Their neighbors may not have moved to the suburbs after all, and the efforts to revitalize the community may be more deadly than advertised.

When does coincidence become conspiracy? Where do people go when gentrification pushes them out? Can Sydney and Theo trust each other – or themselves – long enough to find out, before they too disappear – permanently?

A first-of-its-kind Southern cookbook featuring more than 300 Cook's Country recipes and fascinating insights into the culinary techniques and heroes of the American South.

Tour the diverse history of Southern food through 200+ stories of women who've shaped the cuisine!

Shepherded by Toni Tipton-Martin and Cook's Country Executive Editor and TV personality Morgan Bolling, When Southern Women Cook showcases the hard work, hospitality, and creativity of women who have given soul to Southern cooking from the start. Every page amplifies their contributions, from the enslaved cooks making foundational food at Monticello to Mexican Americans accessing sweet memories with colorful conchas today.

* 70+ voices paint a true picture of the South: Emmy Award–winning producer and author Von Diaz covers Caribbean immigrant foodways through Southern stews; food journalist Kim Severson delves into recipes' power as cultural currency; mixologist and beverage historian Tiffanie Barriere reflects on Juneteenth customs including red drink. Consulting food historian KC Hysmith contributes important—and fascinating—context throughout.

* 300 Recipes—must-knows, little-knowns, and modern inventions: Regional Brunswick Stew, Dollywood Cinnamon Bread, Pickle-Brined Fried Chicken Sandwiches, Grilled Lemongrass Chicken Banh Mi, and Oat Guava Cookies bridge the gap between what Southern cooking is known for and how it continues to evolve.

* Recipe headnotes contextualize your cooking: Learn Edna Lewis’ biscuit wisdom. Read about Waffle House and fry chicken thighs to top light-as-air waffles. Meet Joy Perrine, the "Bad Girl of Bourbon."

Covering every region and flavor of the American South, from Texas Barbecue to Gullah Geechee rice dishes, this collection of 300 recipes is a joyous celebration of Southern cuisine and its diverse heroes, past and present.

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A haunting novel about a black woman who returns to her hometown for a plantation wedding and the horror that ensues as she reconnects with the blood-soaked history of the land and the best friends she left behind.

More than a decade ago, Mira fled her small, segregated hometown in the south to forget. With every mile she traveled, she distanced herself from her past: from her best friend Celine, mocked by their town as the only white girl with black friends; from her old neighborhood; from the eerie Woodsman plantation rumored to be haunted by the spirits of slaves; from the terrifying memory of a ghost she saw that terrible day when a dare-gone-wrong almost got Jesse—the boy she secretly loved—arrested for murder.

From one of the most electric and consequential figures to emerge from the contemporary American labor movement, the remarkable story of his battle to create the first Amazon union in the U.S. and a powerful call to arms on behalf of the working class

In the early days of the Covid pandemic, warehouse worker Chris Smalls and his colleagues continued showing up as the rest of the world was shutting down. A dedicated and experienced Amazon employee, increasingly frustrated by the inner workings of the retail giant, Smalls had already felt himself reaching a breaking point. So, when coworkers around him began falling ill, and with no transparency or assurances of safety coming from those in charge, he made the only choice left available to him. He staged a walkout with friend Derrick Palmer, eventually finding himself on the picket line without a job. But what began as a demand to keep essential employees safe in a crisis would grow into a movement devoted to achieving dignity and security for the American wage worker, sparking a groundswell of organizers at the most notable companies across the nation—including Starbucks, Trader Joe's, and Apple—and leading to lasting change for labor.

When the Revolution Comes is the riveting inside story of how a young Black man from Hackensack, NJ with little-to-no resources led a scrappy band of Staten Island warehouse workers in an improbable fight against Amazon, the second largest private employer in the U.S., and won. This epic David-and-Goliath tale traces Smalls’ dramatic story, from a childhood spent navigating his dad’s stints in and out of prison to his early pursuits of a career in music; from his years of sacrifice and economic uncertainty as a father of three, fighting a miasma of warehouse managerial politics in an effort to make ends meet, to his ascension as the leader of a new generation’s labor movement. Along the way, he details lessons learned from a life spent working paycheck-to-paycheck, advocating for those around him, and persevering in the face of adversity, and shares how those lessons helped him build the coalition that became the first-ever union of American Amazon workers.

A deeply personal and eye-opening account of the creation of the Amazon Labor Union, When the Revolution Comes is both a searing exposé of what it’s like to be working class in America today as well as the empowering story of what is possible when the overworked, underpaid, and disempowered join together, a movement born in community.

The emotional and powerful story from the co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement and how it came to be.

The instant New York Times Bestseller

From one of the co-founders of the Black Lives Matter movement comes a poetic memoir and reflection on humanity. Necessary and timely, Patrisse Cullors’ story asks us to remember that protest in the interest of the most vulnerable comes from love. Leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement have been called terrorists, a threat to America. But in truth, they are loving women whose life experiences have led them to seek justice for those victimized by the powerful. In this meaningful, empowering account of survival, strength, and resilience, Patrisse Cullors and asha bandele seek to change the culture that declares innocent black life expendable.

Winner of the Hurston/Wright Crossover Award

Prince Shakur’s debut memoir brilliantly mines his radicalization and self-realization through examinations of place, childhood, queer identity, and a history of uprisings.

After immigrating from Jamaica to the United States, Prince Shakur’s family is rocked by the murder of Prince’s biological father in 1995. Behind the murder is a sordid family truth, scripted in the lines of a diary by an outlawed uncle hell-bent on avenging the murder of Prince’s father. As Shakur begins to unravel his family’s secrets, he must navigate the strenuous terrain of coming to terms with one’s inner self while confronting the steeped complexities of the Afro-diaspora.

When They Tell You to Be Good charts Shakur’s political coming of age from closeted queer kid in a Jamaican family to radicalized adult traveler, writer, and anarchist in Obama and Trump’s America. Shakur journeys from France to the Philippines, South Korea, and elsewhere to discover the depths of the Black experience, and engages in deep political questions while participating in movements like Black Lives Matter and Standing Rock. By the end, Shakur reckons with his identity, his family’s immigration, and the intergenerational impacts of patriarchal and colonial violence.

Examining a tangled web of race, trauma, and memory, When They Tell You to Be Good shines a light on what we all must ask of ourselves—to be more than what America envisions for the oppressed—as Shakur compels readers to take a closer, deeper look at the political world of young, Black, queer, and radical millennials today.

How the Word Is Passed meets Braiding Sweetgrass in a cultural and personal reclamation of Black history and Black botanical mastery, shared through the stories of long-lived trees.

The histories of trees in America are also the histories of Black Americans. Pecan trees were domesticated by an enslaved African named Antoine; sycamore trees were both havens and signposts for people trying to escape enslavement; poplar trees are historically associated with lynching; and willow bark has offered the gift of medicine. These trees, and others, testify not only to the complexity of the Black American narrative but also to a heritage of Black botanical expertise that, like Native American traditions, predates the United States entirely.

In When Trees Testify, award-winning plant biologist Beronda L. Montgomery explores the way seven trees―as well as the cotton shrub―are intertwined with Black history and culture. She reveals how knowledge surrounding these trees has shaped America since the very beginning. As Montgomery shows, trees are material witnesses to the lives of enslaved Africans and their descendants.

Combining the wisdom of science and history with stories from her own path to botany, Montgomery talks to majestic trees, and in this unique and compelling narrative, they answer.

A bold vision for a Black and Indigenous future rooted in real solidarity, a future that exists beyond the confines of the liberal imagination

Current advocates of reparations for slavery and land back often fail to scrutinize racial capitalism and settler colonialism, instead accepting that their destinies will forever be tied to US empire. But as scholar Kyle T. Mays insists in When We Are Kin, we can and should demand a kind of repair that goes beyond a white supremacist idea of what justice can be. 

In a series of short essays, Mays traces the history of alliances between Black and Indigenous movements; outlines the limitations of certain demands for reparations, including cash payments, that do not fundamentally critique racial-settler capitalism; and interrogates contemporary land back initiatives that fail to fully address decolonization. Along the way, he asks, What does solidarity look like between Black and Indigenous peoples in the United States? Can we find ways to co-belong and co-resist on Turtle Island?

Drawing on the Anishinaabe philosophy of mino-bimaadiziwin (the good life), Mays argues that we can resist as kin only when we center the land in building our collective futures.

Discover the reigns of twelve African queens and warriors from across the continent in this immersive and pioneering history.

Njinga Mbande. Nana Yaa Asantewaa. Makobo Modjadji VI. Ranavalona the First.

These queens and warriors ruled vast swathes of the African continent, where they led, loved, and fought for their kingdoms and people. Their impact can still be felt today, and yet, beyond the lands they called home, so few of us have ever heard their names.

In When We Ruled, historian Paula Akpan takes us into the worlds of these powerful figures, following their stories and how they came to rule and influence the futures of their people. Through deep research and discovery, Akpan will uncover new truths and grapple with uncomfortable realities, allowing us to be immersed in countless moments of bravery, intrigue, and, for some, the unraveling of their rule.

With reigns spanning from pre-colonial Nigeria to the rich lands of Rwanda, and from Ancient Egypt to apartheid South Africa, these rulers shed new light on gender politics in these regions, showing how women were celebrated and revered before colonizing powers took hold, and continued to be long after.

In this game-changing narrative of twelve lives, Akpan takes us on a spellbinding, enrapturing, and immersive history that is nothing short of revelatory.

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This landmark publication accompanies an international touring exhibition devoted to Black figuration in painting from the 1920s to now, featuring artists from Africa and the African diaspora.

Published to accompany a major exhibition at Zeitz MOCAA, CapeTown, When We See Us presents a comprehensive exploration of Black representation through portraiture and figuration, celebrating Black subjectivity and Black consciousness from Pan-African and Pan-Diasporic perspectives.

In the past decade, figurative painting by Black artists has risento a new prominence in the field of contemporary art. This timely and revelatory book highlights the many ways in which artists critically engage with notions of blackness, contributing to the critical discourse on topics such as Pan-Africanism, the Civil Rights Movement, African Liberation and Independence movements, the Anti-Apartheid and Black Consciousness mobilizations, Decoloniality, and Black Lives Matter.

With a primary focus on figurative painting, When We See Us explores how Black artists have imagined, positioned, memorialized, and asserted African and African diasporic experiences from the early 20th century to the present day. Featuring more than 200 works of art—and contributions from well-known writers such as Ken Bugul, Maaza Mengiste, Robin Coste Lewis, and Bill Kouelany—When We See Us is a major contribution to our understanding of Black art that will appeal to anyone interested in modern and contemporary figurative art and Black cultural history.

These are prayers for your moments of gratitude and celebration. For your seasons of loss and waiting. For your days when prayers come, not in words but in groans. When We Talk to God, from poet-theologian Sharifa Stevens, captures the arc and the ache of our lives.

A beautiful interweaving of artwork, prayers, and poems for Black women, this unique book encourages you to lift up your whole heart and loudest voice to God. And to tell Him about everything; nothing is off-limits. Sharifa's honest and powerful words express prayer and longing through personal experiences, biblical examples, and stunning imagery. When We Talk to God offers:

* An invitation to journey through honest lamentation and heartfelt joy to find greater peace in a turbulent world
* Poems and prayers exploring topics from job interviews to grief, from braiding hair to feeling invisible, from parenting to dancing
* Validation and inspiration for Black women of faith, by a Black woman speaking from her life to yours
* A relatable and authentic voice that frees you to present your own prayers and praises to the God who hears you, sees you, and loves you
* A beautiful gift idea for Mother's Day, Grandparents' Day, International Women's Day, spiritual anniversaries, and birthdays

Ideal for Black women of any age and background, When We Talk to God is a balm to your spirit and soul as it urges you to go to God with all of who you are and with everything you can or cannot say.

A mythic love story set in Trinidad, Ayanna Lloyd Banwo’s radiant debut introduces two unforgettable outsiders brought together by their connection with the dead.

“Heartwarming and heartbreaking, fantastical and familiar, with characters that burrow their way into your heart and mind…  [When We Were Birds] is glorious.”—ROBERT JONES JR., New York Times bestselling author of THE PROPHETS

In the old house on a hill, where the city meets the rainforest, Yejide’s mother is dying. She is leaving behind a legacy that now passes to Yejide: one St Bernard woman in every generation has the power to shepherd the city’s souls into the afterlife. But after years of suffering her mother’s neglect and bitterness, Yejide is looking for a way out.

Raised in the countryside by a devout Rastafarian mother, Darwin has always abided by the religious commandment not to interact with death. He has never been to a funeral, much less seen a dead body. But when the only job he can find is grave digging, he must betray the life his mother built for him in order to provide for them both. Newly shorn of his dreadlocks and his past, and determined to prove himself, Darwin finds himself adrift in a city electric with possibility and danger.

Yejide and Darwin will meet inside the gates of Fidelis, an ancient and sprawling cemetery, where the dead lie uneasy in their graves and a reckoning with fate beckons them both. A masterwork of lush imagination and exuberant storytelling, When We Were Birds is a spellbinding and hopeful novel about inheritance, loss, and love’s seismic power to heal.

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An orphan grapples with gender, siblinghood, family, and coming-of-age as a Muslim in America in this lyrical debut novel from the acclaimed author of If They Come For Us

In this heartrending, lyrical debut work of fiction, Fatimah Asghar traces the intense bond of three orphaned siblings who, after their parents die, are left to raise one another. The youngest, Kausar, grapples with the incomprehensible loss of her parents as she also charts out her own understanding of gender; Aisha, the middle sister, spars with her "crybaby" younger sibling as she desperately tries to hold on to her sense of family in an impossible situation; and Noreen, the eldest, does her best in the role of sister-mother while also trying to create a life for herself, on her own terms.
 
As Kausar grows up, she must contend with the collision of her private and public worlds, and choose whether to remain in the life of love, sorrow, and codependency she's known or carve out a new path for herself. When We Were Sisters tenderly examines the bonds and fractures of sisterhood, names the perils of being three Muslim American girls alone against the world, and ultimately illustrates how those who’ve lost everything might still make homes in each other.

From the USA Today bestselling author of Before I Let Go comes a powerful, "achingly beautiful" (A.L. Jackson) novel of one woman on the brink of making a decision that will change her life forever. 

Kerris Moreton knows how to make things work. Bounced from foster home to foster home as a kid, she adapted; when opportunity arose, she thrived. Now, about to open her own business and accept a marriage proposal, Kerris is ready to build the life she's always wanted. The only thing missing? A passionate connection with her would-be fiance, Cam. Kerris wants to believe that sparks are overrated-until Walsh Bennett lights her up like the Fourth of July.

As one of the East Coast's most eligible bachelors, Walsh enjoys financial independence, fulfilling work with his family's nonprofit, and plenty of female attention. But lately he's been distracted by the one woman he can't have. Lovely to look at and even sweeter to know, Kerris is the soul mate Walsh never thought he would find. The problem is, his best friend found her first. 

After reconnecting on a road trip, two friends must decide if love is the ultimate risk worth taking in this funny, emotional sapphic romance.

Nia and Jade had been inseparable ever since their best friend, Michal, introduced them at her tenth birthday party. But now it’s been three years since Michal died of cancer― since the brutal fight Nia and Jade had in the weeks after― and they're barely on speaking terms.

Until Nia reads a letter Michal wrote for her 29th birthday, asking her and Jade to go on the southern Jewish history road trip they'd planned before she died. To add to the complications, Michal's then-boyfriend and Jade's twin brother, Jonah, joins the trip. Despite the years apart and Jade and Jonah’s strained relationship, any awkwardness quickly disappears as it becomes clear how much Nia and Jade have missed each other.

Unfortunately, old issues soon arise. Nia has been in love with Jade since they were teenagers, and Jade has been so committed to their friendship that she never let herself consider something more. As the stops pass, tensions mount, running high until Nia and Jade are forced to confront what happened three years ago, their feelings for one another, and even their respective relationships with Jonah.

Rachel Runya Katz’s Whenever You’re Ready is about family, friendship, and the kind of first love that could last a lifetime―if only you are willing to take a chance.

"Poignant, tender, and swoony, Whenever You're Ready is an instant favorite from an auto-buy author." - Alison Cochrun, Lambda award-winning author of Kiss Her Once for Me and Here We Go Again

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In 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., isolated himself from the demands of the civil rights movement, rented a house in Jamaica with no telephone, and labored over his final manuscript. In this prophetic work, which has been unavailable for more than ten years, he lays out his thoughts, plans, and dreams for America's future, including the need for better jobs, higher wages, decent housing, and quality education. With a universal message of hope that continues to resonate, King demanded an end to global suffering, asserting that humankind-for the first time-has the resources and technology to eradicate poverty.

A multidisciplinary illustrated reader unpacking imperialist representations of Africa by promoting dialogue, memory and everyday practice, and reimagining cultural institutions and the arts—from museums to academia, from architecture to art.

In 2017, curator and art historian Anita N. Bateman and architect and professor Emanuel Admassu initiated research on the traditional positioning and mispositioning of the arts across the African continent. Where Is Africa has been an extended set of exchanges with contemporary artists, curators, designers and academics who are actively engaged in representing the continent—both within and outside its geographic boundaries. By examining artist collectives, new currents in art history and the rise of contemporary art festivals in and about Africa from the past 10 years, the project unpacks the imperialist foundations of cultural institutions and their anthropological fascination with African objects, people and places.

The interviews in Where Is Africa examine African and African-diasporic identities and spaces through questions of positionality in relation to specific disciplinary, cultural and political contexts. The texts address Afro-diasporic aesthetic practices and the curatorial, museological and artistic matrices that confront epistemologies of dominance and exclusion. The commissioned essays and images offer concise methodologies that expand or complicate issues addressed by the interviewees.

Where Is Africa is a conceptual project that accompanies a conceptual place, driven by the desire to dislodge Africa from categorical fixity and the representational logics of nation-states. Africa can never be fully enclosed by the residue of colonial violence or the totalitarian gaze of neoliberalism; instead, it creates infinite malleability, where place and concept are untethered from each other.

Contributors include: Mikael Awake, Salome Asega, Tau Tavengwa, Anthony Bogues, Jay Simple, Eric Gottesman, Rebecca Corey, Aida Mulkozi, Rakeb Sile, Mesai Haileleul, Mpho Matsipa, Naiama Safia Sandy, Adama Delphine Fawundu, Rehema Chachage, Robel Temesgen, Valerie Amani, Meskerem Assegued, Elias Sime, Olalekan Jeyifous, Amanda Williams, Germane Barnes and Mario Gooden.

n Where Sleeping Girls Lie ― a YA contemporary mystery by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé, the New York Times-bestselling author of Ace of Spades ― a girl new to boarding school discovers dark secrets and coverups after her roommate disappears. It’s like I keep stumbling into a dark room, searching for the switch to make things bright again... Sade Hussein is starting her third year of high school, this time at the prestigious Alfred Nobel Academy boarding school after being home-schooled all her life. Misfortune has been a constant companion all her life, but even Sade doesn’t expect her new roommate, Elizabeth, to disappear after Sade’s first night. Or for people to think she had something to do with it. With rumors swirling around her, Sade catches the attention of the girls collectively known as the ‘Unholy Trinity’ and they bring her into their fold. Between learning more about them―especially Persephone, who Sade is inexplicably drawn to―and playing catchup in class, Sade already has so much on her plate. But when it seems people don't care enough about what happened to Elizabeth to really investigate, it's up to she and Elizabeth's best friend to solve it. And then a student is found dead. As they keep trying to figure out what’s going on, Sade realizes there’s more to Alfred Nobel Academy and its students than she thought. Secrets lurk around every corner and beneath every surface…secrets that rival even her own.

A gripping, richly imagined fantasy set in an alternate ancient African world in which a Black girl finds her power and saves her people from evil, by the Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Award-winning author of Black Panther: The Young Prince. 

In the land of Alkebulan, twelve-year-old Asha is an orphan, raised by Madame S, the proprietor of a traveling carnival. When Madame S is attacked by ghoulish creatures, she manages to tell Asha before she dies, “Seek the Underground Kingdom, where the black flowers bloom.”

Asha doesn’t understand the mysterious words, but they launch her onto a page-turning quest to protect her people and stop an ancient evil. Along the way, she uncovers shocking secrets about the family she never knew and begins to find her place in the world as she discovers her own untapped powers.

*ships in 7 - 10 business days*

Where the Line Bleeds is Jesmyn Ward’s gorgeous first novel and the first of three novels set in Bois Sauvage—followed by Salvage the Bones and Sing, Unburied, Sing—comprising a loose trilogy about small town sourthern family life. Described as “starkly beautiful” (Publishers Weekly, starred review), “fearless” (Essence), and “emotionally honest” (The Dallas Morning News), it was a finalist for the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award and the Virginia Commonwealth University Cabell First Novelist Award.

Joshua and Christophe are twins, raised by a blind grandmother and a large extended family in rural Bois Sauvage, on Mississippi’s Gulf Coast. They’ve just finished high school and need to find jobs, but after Katrina, it’s not easy. Joshua gets work on the docks, but Christophe’s not so lucky and starts to sell drugs. Christophe’s downward spiral is accelerated first by crack, then by the reappearance of the twins’ parents: Cille, who left for a better job, and Sandman, a dangerous addict. Sandman taunts Christophe, eventually provoking a shocking confrontation that will ultimately damn or save both twins.

Where the Line Bleeds takes place over the course of a single, life-changing summer. It is a delicate and closely observed portrait of fraternal love and strife, of the relentless grind of poverty, of the toll of addiction on a family, and of the bonds that can sustain or torment us. Bois Sauvage, based on Ward’s own hometown, is a character in its own right, as stiflingly hot and as rich with history as it is bereft of opportunity. Ward’s “lushly descriptive prose…and her prodigious talent and fearless portrayal of a world too often overlooked” (Essence) make this novel an essential addition to her incredible body of work.