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An illustrated highlight reel of more than 100 women in rap who have helped shape the genre and eschewed gender norms in the process
 
The Motherlode highlights more than 100 women who have shaped the power, scope, and reach of rap music, including pioneers like Roxanne Shanté, game changers like Lauryn Hill and Missy Elliott, and current reigning queens like Nicki Minaj,  Cardi B, and Lizzo—as well as everyone who came before, after, and in between. Some of these women were respected but not widely celebrated. Some are impossible not to know. Some of these women have stood on their own; others were forced into templates, compelled to stand beside men in big rap crews. Some have been trapped in a strange critical space between respected MC and object. They are characters, caricatures, lyricists, at times both feminine and explicit. This book profiles each of these women, their musical and career breakthroughs, and the ways in which they each helped change the culture of rap.

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Set within a contemporary black community in Southern California, Brit Bennett's mesmerizing first novel is an emotionally perceptive story about community, love, and ambition. It begins with a secret.

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Still reeling from the sudden death of her mother, Jess is about to do the hardest thing she's ever done: empty her childhood home so that it can be sold.  As she sorts through a lifetime of memories, everything comes to a halt when she comes across something she just can’t part with: an old set of encyclopedias.  To the world, the books are outdated and ready to be recycled.  To Jess, they represent love and the future that her mother always wanted her to have. 

In the process of finding the books a new home, Jess discovers an unusual archive of letters, photographs, and curious housed in a warehouse and known as the Museum of Ordinary People.  Irresistibly drawn, she becomes the museum's unofficial custodian, along with the warehouse’s mysterious owner.  As they delve into the history of objects in their care, they not only unravel heart-stirring stories that span generations and continents, but also unearth long-buried secrets that lie closer to home.

Inspired by an abandoned box of mementos, The Museum of Ordinary People is a poignant novel about memory and loss, the things we leave behind, and the future we create for ourselves.  
 

Deciphers the history of “Black capitalist” rhetoric— and how it serves to enrich a minuscule few at the expense of the many

In his 1970 book The Myth of Black Capitalism, Earl Ofari Hutchinson laid out a rigorous challenge to the presumption that capitalism, in any shape or form, has the potential to rectify the stark injustices endured by Black people in America. Ofari engaged in a diligent historical review of the participation of African Americans in commercial activity in this capitalist country, demonstrating conclusively that the creation of a class of Black capitalists failed to ameliorate the extreme inequity faced by African Americans. Even “Buy Black” campaigns which aimed to “keep resources in the community,” he showed, reinforced a Black bourgeoisie which often enough exploited the Black underclass to increase their own wealth. Whether Black capitalists dared to go up against, or merely tried to find their place amongst, giant monopoly corporations, Ofari argued they would make little substantive progress in the lives of Black people. And whether calls for “Black capitalism” came from within the Black Power movement for Black economic autonomy, or were appropriated by the old-line Black elite, in the end the promotion of the myth of “Black capitalism” was a project of the Black elite which solely served the interests of the capitalist managerial class.

It was Richard Nixon who first introduced the notion of “Black capitalism” into mainstream American discourse, coopting the term at a time when African Americans comprised only 3% of the nation’s employers. That number dwindled thereafter, and yet the term only gained cachet following the election of Barack Obama and the increased visibility of the Black elite. Thankfully, just as the rhetoric of ‘Black capitalism” is being resuscitated, it is being confronted once more. In this second edition of Earl Ofari’s pathbreaking book, a Monthly Review Press classic, the author adds a new Introduction, which shows both the enduring strength of the ideology of Black capitalism and its continued inability to change the nature of what has always been a racialized system of production and distribution. Ofari reveals “Black capitalism" for what it really is: a diversion from the struggle for liberation that works at cross purposes with the fight against exploitation, and a fantasy which enriches a minuscule few at the expense of the many. The Myth of Black Capitalism argues definitively that only a direct assault on the oppression of Black people and the capitalist system itself can bring this exploitation to an end.

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The Nameplate is a vibrant photographic celebration of nameplate jewelry featuring deeply personal stories and rich cultural contexts, collected by the creators of the Documenting the Nameplate project.

Nameplate jewelry comes in many shapes, styles, and sizes—from simple scripted pendants to bejeweled rings, belts, and bracelets with a first, last, and/or nickname. Like so many individuals who proudly wear nameplates, Marcel Rosa-Salas and Isabel Attyah Flower were first introduced to this storied jewelry during childhood. Their love of the style gradually blossomed into a wide-reaching research project, Documenting the Nameplate, through which they've spent years collecting photographs and testimonials from nameplate-wearers across the country and world.

Featuring essays and interviews from scholars and cultural figures, portraits by contemporary photographers, archival imagery, and a historical exploration into the multifaceted and often overlooked significance of nameplate jewelry, The Nameplate is a tribute to the people who make, wear, and cherish it.

The Nap Ministry's Rest Deck is a rousing call to reclaim rest in everyday life. Delivered in a stunning package with gold accents and gorgeous artwork throughout, the deck combines restorative meditations with prescient wisdom from celebrated activist and teaching artist Tricia Hersey, a.k.a. "the Nap Bishop," and founder of the Nap Ministry.

Readers will discover 50 inspiring cards, each with an empowering affirmation and a simple practice to encourage rest, care, and imagination. Rooted in social justice and imbued with spirituality, these cards offer short, accessible practices designed to uplift anyone suffering from the toxic effects of grind culture.

CELEBRATED AUTHOR: Tricia Hersey, a.k.a. "the Nap Bishop," is the founder of the Nap Ministry and the bestselling author of Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto. Her work as a social justice activist, artist, and thought leader has been featured by the New York Times, NPR, The Cut, and the Atlantic, among many others. In this deck, she distills her profound and celebrated teachings into 50 accessible practices. 
 
TOOL FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE: Brimming with practices to empower personal liberation as a step toward building a healthier, more just world, this deck offers readers a new way to engage with social justice and invites a wide audience to embrace the power of rest as an essential balm for our collective exhaustion. 
 
BEAUTIFUL TO GIFT AND DISPLAY: This bold, eye-catching package with colorful illustrations and gold accents is a beautiful and meaningful gift for friends, activists, and anyone feeling overwhelmed and exhausted by the demands of grind culture. 

• A powerful new tool for social justice activists
• Great gift or self-purchase for socially engaged millennials and Gen-Zers
• For anyone seeking mindful affirmation cards to aid their healing practice
• Perfect for fans of the Nap Ministry, Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto, Layla Saad, Adrienne Maree Brown, Chani Nicholas, and Alex Elle
• For readers of Me and White Supremacy, I’m Still Here, and How to Do Nothing

It’s Saturday, past midnight, and thick fog rolls in from the river like smoke. Link Williams is standing on the dock when he hears quick footsteps approaching, and the gasp of a woman too terrified to scream. After chasing off her pursuer, he takes the woman to a nearby bar to calm her nerves, and as they enter, it’s as if the oxygen has left the room: they, and the other patrons, see in the dim light that he’s Black and she’s white.

Link is a brilliant Dartmouth graduate, former athlete and soldier who, because of the lack of opportunities available to him, tends bar; Camilo is a wealthy married woman dissatisfied with and bored of her life of privilege. Thrown together by a chance encounter, both Link and Camilo secretly cross the town’s racial divide, defying the social prejudices of their times.

In this stunning and heartbreaking story, Petry illuminates the harsh realities of race and class through two doomed lovers. This profound, necessary novel stakes Petry’s place as an indelible writer of American literature. 

Long out of print, the Negro in Sport is a reprint of the 1949 edition with the addition of an introduction by the historian Al-Tony Gilmore

The bestselling, definitive study of African Americans throughout American history, now with a new introduction by noted scholar V. P. Franklin.

In The Negro in the Making of America, eminent historian Benjamin Quarles provides one of the most comprehensive and readable accounts ever gathered in one volume of the role that African Americans have played in shaping the destiny of America. Starting with the arrival of the slave ships in the early 1600s and moving through the Colonial period, the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, and into the last half of the twentieth century, Quarles chronicles the sweep of events that have brought blacks and their struggle for social and economic equality to the forefront of American life.

Through compelling portraits of central political, historical, and artistic figures such as Nat Turner, Frederick Douglass, Duke Ellington, Malcolm X, and the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., Quarles illuminates the African American contributions that have enriched the cultural heritage of America. This classic history also covers black participation in politics, the rise of a black business class, and the forms of discrimination experienced by blacks in housing, employment, and the media.

Quarles's groundbreaking work not only surveys the role of black Americans as they engaged in the dual, simultaneous processes of assimilating into and transforming the culture of their country, but also, in a portrait of the white response to blacks, holds a mirror up to the deeper moral complexion of our nation's history. The restoration of this history holds a redemptive quality—one that can be used, in the author's words, as a "vehicle for present enlightenment, guidance, and enrichment."

A shy bookworm enlists her charming neighbor to help her score a date, not knowing he’s the obscure author she’s been corresponding with, in this sparkling and heart-fluttering romance by Kristina Forest.

Shy, bookish, and admittedly awkward, Lily Greene has always felt inadequate compared to the rest of her accomplished family, who strive for Black excellence. She dreams of becoming a children’s book editor, but she’s been frustratingly stuck in the nonfiction division for years without a promotion in sight. Lily finds escapism in her correspondences with her favorite fantasy author, and what begins as two lonely people connecting over email turns into a tentative friendship and possibly something else Lily won’t let herself entertain—until he ghosts her without a word.

Months later, Lily is still crushed, but she’s determined to get a hold of her life, starting with finding a date to her sister’s wedding. And the perfect person to help her is Nick Brown, her charming, attractive new neighbor, who she feels drawn to for reasons she can’t explain. But little does she know, Nick is an author—her favorite fantasy author.

Nick, who has his reasons for using a pen name and pushing people away, soon realizes that the beautiful, quiet girl from down the hall is the same Lily he fell in love with over email months ago. Unwilling to complicate things even more between them, he agrees to set her up with someone else, though this simple favor between two neighbors is anything but—not when he can't get her off his mind...

Seldom does a book have the impact of Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow. Since it was first published in 2010, it has been cited in judicial decisions and has been adopted in campus-wide and community-wide reads; it helped inspire the creation of the Marshall Project and the new $100 million Art for Justice Fund; it has been the winner of numerous prizes, including the prestigious NAACP Image Award; and it has spent nearly 250 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list.

Most important of all, it has spawned a whole generation of criminal justice reform activists and organizations motivated by Michelle Alexander's unforgettable argument that "we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it." As the Birmingham News proclaimed, it is "undoubtedly the most important book published in this century about the U.S."

Now, ten years after it was first published, The New Press is proud to issue a tenth-anniversary edition with a new preface by Michelle Alexander that discusses the impact the book has had and the state of the criminal justice reform movement today.

The New Negro (1925) is an anthology by Alain Locke. Expanded from a March issue of Survey Graphic magazine, The New Negro compiles writing from such figures as Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Jean Toomer, and Locke himself. Recognized as a foundational text of the Harlem Renaissance, the collection is organized around Locke’s writing on the function of art in reorganizing the conception of African American life and culture. Through self-understanding, creation, and independence, Locke’s New Negro came to represent a break from an inhumane past, a means toward meaningful change for a people held down for far too long.

“[F]or generations in the mind of America, the Negro has been more of a formula than a human being—a something to be argued about, condemned or defended, to be ‘kept down,’ or ‘in his place,’ or ‘helped up,’ to be worried with or worried over, harassed or patronized, a social bogey or a social burden.” Identifying the representation of black Americans in the national imaginary as oppressive in nature, Locke suggests a way forward through his theory of the New Negro, who “wishes to be known for what he is, even in his faults and shortcomings, and scorns a craven and precarious survival at the price of seeming to be what he is not.” Throughout The New Negro, leading artists and intellectuals of the Harlem Renaissance offer their unique visions of who and what they are; voicing their concerns, portraying injustice, and illuminating the black experience, they provide a holistic vision of self-expression in all of its colors and forms.

With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Alain Locke’s The New Negro is a classic of African American literature reimagined for modern readers.

The first tarot to celebrate an African-American culture, this book and 79-card deck capture both the spirit and the imagery of Voodoo`s African, West Indian, and Catholic influences. Ancient and earth-honoring, Voodoo`s practices take on different forms specific to time and place, but its essence remains focused on the loa--the potent spiritual forces of Voodoo that are manifested directly through human beings and their actions. The authors draw strong parallels between the Waite and Thoth Tarots, the Kabalistic Tree of Life, and the Voodoo tradition as it is practiced in New Orleans. Just as the major and minor arcana of the Tarot represent the archetypes of the human psyche and the natural forces of our world, so do the loa of Voodoo embody the primal energies of the universe. With a variety of spreads and readings, the authors show how the Tarot can be an idea channel through which the loa exercise their powers to teach, advise, and initiate the serious student into their mysteries

It’s the early 1960s, and as the Civil Rights movement begins to reach segregated Tallahassee, the young, deeply principled Elwood Curtis takes the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to heart: he is “as good as anyone.”

He is about to enroll in the local black college, but for a black boy in the Jim Crow South, one innocent mistake is enough to destroy the future. Elwood is sentenced to a juvenile reformatory called the Nickel Academy, a grotesque chamber of horrors where the sadistic staff beats and sexually abuses the students, corrupt officials steal food and supplies, and any boy who resists is likely to disappear “out back.” Stunned to find himself in such a vicious environment, Elwood tries to hold on to Dr. King’s ringing assertion: “Throw us in jail and we will still love you.” His friend Turner thinks Elwood is worse than naive—that the world is crooked and the only way to survive is to scheme and avoid trouble. The tension between Elwood’s ideals and Turner’s skepticism leads to a decision whose repercussions will echo down the decades.

Formed in the crucible of the evils Jim Crow wrought, the boys’ fates will be determined by what they endured at the Nickel Academy.

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In this twisty and electrifying debut novel, a young woman goes missing in Lagos, Nigeria, and her estranged auntie will stop at nothing to find the truth behind her disappearance. Perfect for fans of My Sister, the Serial Killer and The Last Thing He Told Me.

Nicole Oruwari has the perfect life: a hand­some husband; a palatial house in the heart of glittering Lagos, Nigeria; and a glamorous group of friends. She left gloomy London and a troubled family past behind for sunny, moneyed Lagos, becoming part of the Nigerwives—a com­munity of foreign women married to Nigerian men.

But when Nicole disappears without a trace after a boat trip, the cracks in her so-called perfect life start to show. As the investigation turns up nothing but dead ends, her auntie Claudine decides to take matters into her own hands. Armed with only a cell phone and a plane ticket to Nigeria, she digs into her niece’s life and uncov­ers a hidden side filled with dark secrets, isolation, and even violence. But the more she discovers about Nicole, the more Claudine’s own buried history threatens to come to light.

An inventively told and keenly observant thriller where nothing is as it seems, The Nigerwife offers a razor-sharp look at the bonds of family, the echoing consequences of secrets, and whether we can ever truly outrun our past.

Journey with a young girl as she explores the mesmerizing wonders of a Nigerian night market, where each stall is an adventure waiting to be discovered! Filled with vibrant illustrations, this captivating picture book invites young readers into a world of magic, mystery, and the joy of finding treasures in unexpected places.

The Night Market is here again, and all one girl needs is a bag of gold coins to enter. The market is alive with the sound of hawkers and traders. “A taste of tangy sweetness!” hollers a man behind a towering fountain of lemonade. “I’ll trade you a joke for a coin,” a little boy calls. “Home grown spices!” shouts a granny at a counter. What should the girl buy? But, wait! Do you hear that? It's the sound of an old African drum. Have a turn, then learn to make cards disappear when you shout Abracadabra! When the sun starts to rise and the night market winds down, the girl has one gold coin left—just enough to buy a return ticket to the night market.

With stunning illustrations by Nigerian-American artist Briana Mukodiri Uchendu, here is an enchanting read aloud about curiosity and the wonders that lie hidden in plain sight.

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Mystery bookstore owner Samantha Washington is trying to keep her grandmother from spending her golden years in an orange jumpsuit . . .
 
The small town of North Harbor, Michigan, is just not big enough for the two of them: flamboyant phony Maria Romanov and feisty Nana Jo. The insufferable Maria claims she's descended from Russian royalty and even had a fling with King Edward VIII back in the day. She’s not just a lousy liar, she's a bad actress, so when she nabs the lead in the Shady Acres Senior Follies—a part Nana Jo plays every year in their retirement village production—Nana Jo blows a gasket and reads her the riot act in front of everyone.
 
Of course, when Maria is silenced with a bullet to the head, Nana Jo lands the leading role on the suspects list. Sam’s been writing her newest mystery, set in England between the wars, with her intrepid heroine Lady Daphne drawn into murder and scandal in the household of Winston Churchill. But now she has to prove that Nana Jo’s been framed. With help from her grandmother's posse of rambunctious retirees, Sam shines a spotlight on Maria’s secrets, hoping to draw the real killer out of the shadows . . .
 

Does a second chance at happiness include your husband's three best friends?

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The creators of The Old Truck set sail with an old boat and an evocative, intricately crafted exploration of home and family.

Off a small island,

an old boat sets sail

and a young boy

finds home.

Together, boy and boat ride the shifting tides, catching wants and wishes until fate calls for a sea change. Brothers and collaborators Jarrett and Jerome PumphreyÕs newest picture book is a masterfully crafted celebration of the natural world and tribute to the families we make and the homes that we nurture.

“Gripping and passionate . . . keenly recounted . . . full of poetry.”—New York Times

Now in a beautiful new edition, the spellbinding classic tale of man and nature, honor, and adventure, in which the peaceful life of an aging, book-loving widower in the Ecuadorean jungle is upended when an ignorant tourist provokes a mother ocelot.

Antonio José Bolivar Proaño lives quietly in a river town in the rain-soaked jungle of Ecuador that is slowly being overrun by tourists and opportunists. Having lost his wife decades earlier, he takes refuge in books—paperback novels of faraway places and bittersweet love, delivered to him by the dentist who visits the village twice a year.

One day, a greedy trader pushes nature too far, setting an enraged mother ocelot on a bloody rampage through the village. The old man, a hunter who once lived among the Shuar Indians and knows the jungle better than anyone, is pressured by the village's detested mayor to join the expedition to kill the animal. Reluctantly. the old man is forced into the middle of a raging conflict between man and nature that will end in a powerfully climactic confrontation.

A young girl turns her imagination into action in this beautifully crafted and intricately designed debut picture book.

When is an old truck something more? On a small, bustling farm, a resilient and steadfast pickup works tirelessly alongside the family that lives there, and becomes a part of the dreams and ambitions of the family’s young daughter.

After long days and years of hard work leave the old truck rusting in the weeds, it’s time for the girl to roll up her sleeves. Soon she is running her own busy farm, and in the midst of all the repairing and restoring, it may be time to bring her faithful childhood companion back to life.

With an eye-catching retro design and cleverly nuanced illustrations, The Old Truck celebrates the rewards of determination and the value of imagination.

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A collection of raucous stories that offer a panoramic view of New Orleans from the author of the “stunning and audacious” (NPR) debut novel We Cast a Shadow.

Maurice Carlos Ruffin has an uncanny ability to reveal the hidden corners of a place we thought we knew. These perspectival, character-driven stories center on the margins and are deeply rooted in New Orleanian culture.

In “Beg Borrow Steal,” a boy relishes time spent helping his father find work after just coming home from prison; in “Ghetto University,” a couple struggling financially turns to crime after hitting rock bottom; in “Before I Let You Go,” a woman who’s been in NOLA for generations fights to keep her home; in “Fast Hands, Fast Feet,” an Army vet and a runaway teen find companionship while sleeping under a bridge; in “Mercury Forges,” a flash fiction piece among several in the collection, a group of men hurriedly make their way to a home where an elderly gentleman lives, trying to reach him before the water from Hurricane Katrina does; and in the title story, a young man works the street corners of the French Quarter, trying to achieve a freedom not meant for him.

These stories are intimate invitations to hear, witness, and imagine lives at once regional but largely universal, and undeniably New Orleanian.

A captivating debut collection exploring longing, loneliness, and connection, in stories that feature Cuban American characters and uncanny, speculative twists.

In the tradition of narrativa de lo inusual (narrative of the unusual), The Only Sound Is the Wind combines the fantastic with the everyday, weaving elements of magical realism and surrealist twists to sharpen our view of human (and animal) connection. In the title story, the arrival of a mail-order clone complicates a burgeoning romance; a lonely librarian longing for her homeland strikes up an unusual relationship in the award-winning “The Moth”; when humans start giving birth to puppies and kittens in “This New Turn,” a realignment of the natural order ensues. With a playful tenderness and satirical bent, The Only Sound Is the Wind explores solitude and communion, opening strange new worlds where characters try to make their way toward love.

Breathtaking in every form, The Opposite of Breathing is Cement is an ode to healing by exposing long-held wounds to the light in hopes that something fruitful is created. Icess Fernandez Rojas' debut collection dribbles between political arches, cultural identity, love, and mental illness where in dark corners of the mind exists a brave flicker from a candle. That light is more than hope, it's the start of something new. "We yell our whispers and /save subtlety for our art" in "Forgetting Cuba;" in "My Mothers," Rojas asks to "Recall baptism in clear waters, salted by Earth and divine prayers / slapped awake by rolling waves." She plays with form in duplexes and letters, which provides a brevity to the otherwise intense pacing of this collection. Yearn for a change that "comes in pixels and presence / in proclamations and the pounding of feet on cement." Through these poems, bruises, lacerations, and grief are laid bare in unapologetic language. However, from these words also comes joy from the most surprising places, happiness among the ruins of despair, and images of something better always promised around the next corner.

Twenty-six-year-old editorial assistant Nella Rogers is tired of being the only Black employee at Wagner Books. Fed up with the isolation and microaggressions, she’s thrilled when Harlem-born and bred Hazel starts working in the cubicle beside hers. They’ve only just started comparing natural hair care regimens, though, when a string of uncomfortable events elevates Hazel to Office Darling, and Nella is left in the dust.

Then the notes begin to appear on Nella’s desk: LEAVE WAGNER. NOW.

It’s hard to believe Hazel is behind these hostile messages. But as Nella starts to spiral and obsess over the sinister forces at play, she soon realizes that there’s a lot more at stake than just her career.