New Releases
- WASH
WASH
$18.00WASH brutally dissects black womxnhood for all its blood, beauty, sacrifice and strength. Ebony Stewart's praise and pleas for the lives of black womxn create a devotional space for healing.
Stewart's third collection is uncompromising and emotionally raw. Through trauma and recovery, black girlhood comes of age in WASH, journeying through moments of self-discovery, mental illness, love and heartbreak. Stewart reckons traditional definitions of womxnhood, exploring its complications, its communities, and its queerness.
With a distinct, lyrical poetic voice, WASH tells a story of queer, black womxnhood that perseveres. A collection that will bring you to tears and brighten your day, Ebony Stewart's WASH cannot be missed! - I Got Abducted by Aliens and Now I'm Trapped in a Rom-Com
I Got Abducted by Aliens and Now I'm Trapped in a Rom-Com
Kimberly Lemming
$19.00A hilarious and sexy romance about a woman who gets dropped on a strange planet only to fall for not one, but two, aliens, from the author of I Got Drunk and Yeeted a Love Potion at a Werewolf.
Dorothy Valentine is close to getting her PhD in wildlife biology when she’s attacked by a lion. On the bright side, she’s saved! On the not-so-bright side, it’s because they’re abducted by aliens. In her scramble to escape, Dory and the lion commandeer an escape pod and crash-land on an alien planet that has...dinosaurs?
Dory and her new lion bestie, Toto, are saved in the nick of time by a mysterious and sexy alien, Sol. On their new adventure, they team up with the equally hot, equally dangerous Lok, who may or may not be a war criminal. Whether it be trauma, fate, or intrigue, Dory can’t resist the attraction that’s developing in their trio....
As this ragtag group of misfits explore their new planet, Dory learns more about how and why they’ve all ended up together, battles more prehistoric creatures than she imagined (she imagined...zero), and questions if she even wants to go back home to Earth in this hilarious and steamy alien romance adventure comedy romp.
- Before You Climb Any Higher: Valley Wisdom for Mountain Dreams
Before You Climb Any Higher: Valley Wisdom for Mountain Dreams
Jonathan McReynolds
$19.99We long for mountaintop experiences, but they’re difficult to achieve and impossible to maintain without the rest, nourishment, and strength found in lush, life-giving valleys. GRAMMY Award winner Jonathan McReynolds shows us why having a valley mindset is not what you think—it’s about receiving God’s grace, love, and encouragement as His beloved child.
Life is full of mountains to ascend, driven by our dreams, ambitions, and callings. But it doesn’t take much for even the strongest climbers to grow weary or lose their way. It’s important to have a “mountain mindset” to help us establish goals, to make steady progress, to achieve success, to do big things for God. A great mission requires from us a little grind, a little hustle, a little competition. But also plenty of time in the valley.
Most people equate valley moments with difficulty and pain, but a “valley mentality” is different according to Jonathan McReynolds. He’s reached the mountaintop—GRAMMY Award, nationwide tours, millions of followers, and more—but he experienced more refreshment, rest, and encouragement from the Lord off the mountain. He writes, “The valley is not about finishing anything, studying anything, or doing anything, but simply being a child of God.” In Before You Climb Any Higher, readers will discover:
* Taking breaks from climbing is necessary for your mental health
* Ways to find rest, renewal, and authentic community in the valley
* Identity should never be wrapped up in success and accolades
* How to prepare for the mountain climb with lessons learned in the valley
* It’s possible to live abundantly in the valley and on the mountainWe are more than our accomplishments, more than our mountaintop accomplishments. We are sons and daughters of God, who is calling us to rest in the valley, to replenish our souls, to be formed by the Spirit, to discover abundant life that is found only in Him.
- Easter Fun: A Brown Baby Parade Book
Easter Fun: A Brown Baby Parade Book
Nikki Shannon Smith & Ashley Evans
$8.99It’s time for some Easter fun! Read along as a young girl spends Easter Sunday with her family in this next installment of the Brown Baby Parade board book series that's perfect for ages 0-3.
I quickly spy a pink egg.
But guess what? There are more!
We have to keep on hunting,
much harder than before.A little girl and her family celebrate Easter by visiting loved ones, eating a special meal, and going on an Easter egg hunt.
Nikki Shannon Smith's bouncy, rhythmic text and Ashley Evans's vivid, welcoming illustrations pair beautifully to create heartwarming scenes of everyday life. The joyful depiction of a Black family celebrating Easter traditions together will allow children to relate no matter how they celebrate!
- Halfway to Somewhere
Halfway to Somewhere
Jose Pimienta
$13.99New school, new country, but only half a family?! Embark on a coming of age journey with a middle school teen navigating their parent’s divorce while moving to a new country in this stunning graphic novel.
Ave thought moving to Kansas would be boring and flat after enjoying the mountains and trails in Mexico, but at least they would have their family with them. Unfortunately, while Ave, their mom, and their younger brother are relocating to the US, Ave's father and older sister will be staying in Mexico...permanently. Their parents are getting a divorce.
As if learning a whole new language wasn't hard enough, and now a Middle-Schooler has to figure out a new family dynamic...and what this means for them as they start middle school with no friends.
Jose Pimienta's stunningly illustrated and thought provoking middle graphic novel is about exploring identity, understanding family, making friends with a language barrier, and above all else, learning what truly makes a place a home.
- Tíos y primos (Tíos and Primos Spanish Edition)
Tíos y primos (Tíos and Primos Spanish Edition)
Jaqueline Alcántara & Yanitzia Canetti
$18.99EDICIÓN EN ESPAÑOL
Una niña conoce a más parientes de los que puede contar, pero ¿cómo se comunicará con ellos si no puede hablar español con la misma fluidez?
A little girl meets more relatives than she can count—but how will she communicate with them if she can’t speak their language?
(edición en español)
Es el primer viaje de una niñaal país natal de su papá, y ella está impresionada con los paisajes maravillos, los sonidos sorprendentes ¡y especialmente con el tamaño de su enorme familia! Pero sabe solo un poco de español y le resulta difícil compartir chistes y anécdotas con fluidez. Por suerte, sus parientes la ayudan a ver que hay otras maneras de relacionarse. Pronto la niña siente que está justo donde pertenece: en el corazón de una familia amorosa, aprendiendo mientras crece.(Spanish edition)
It’s a little girl’s first trip to her papa’s homeland, and she’s wowed by all the amazing sights and sounds—and especially by the size of her enormous family! But she only knows a little Spanish, and it’s hard not to be able to share jokes and stories. Fortunately, her relatives help her see that there are other ways they can connect, and soon she feels like she’s right where she belongs: in the heart of a loving family, learning as she goes along. - Pet Sitter #5 (Miles Lewis)
Pet Sitter #5 (Miles Lewis)
Kelly Starling Lyons & Wayne Spencer
$6.99From the award-winning author of the Jada Jones chapter books comes an illustrated spin-off series perfect for STEM fans!
When Miles and his classmates welcome a few frogs as class pets, it's a reminder that what he really wants more than anything is a dog to call his own. But his parents don't think he's ready, and his attempts to show them that he truly can care for critters all end in disaster. Can Miles pull it together and prove that he's responsible enough for a pet once and for all?
- Tíos and Primos
Tíos and Primos
Jaqueline Alcántara
$18.99A little girl meets more relatives than she can count—but how will she communicate with them if she can’t speak their language?
It’s a little girl’s first tripto her papa’s homeland, and she’s wowed by all the amazing sights and sounds—and especially by the size of her enormous family! But she only knows a little Spanish, and it’s hard not to be able to share jokes and stories. Fortunately, her relatives help her see that there are other ways they can connect, and soon she feels like she’s right where she belongs: in the heart of a loving family, learning as she goes along.
- Cursebound: A Novel (The Faebound Trilogy)
Cursebound: A Novel (The Faebound Trilogy)
Saara El-Arifi
$30.00Yeeran and Lettle are no longer prisoners to the fae court, but now they’re bound by shackles of their hearts, in this sequel to Faebound from the national bestselling author.
United by war.
Betrayed by destiny.
Cursed by love.Yeeran was born for war but is unprepared for love. She has left her new lover, the Queen of the fae, to return to her homeland, only to find that her former lover now threatens war against the fae.
Left behind, her sister Lettle is determined to break the curse that binds the fae to their realm. When a stranger appears in the city, Lettle is convinced he’s the key. But the Fates that once spoke to her have fallen silent.
Can Lettle and Yeeran discover the secret behind the curse—and unite these two worlds before they destroy each other?
Book Two of the Faebound Trilogy
Don’t miss any of Saara El-Arifi’s magical Faebound Trilogy:
FAEBOUND • CURSEBOUND - Black Elegies: Meditations on the Art of Mourning (On Seeing)
Black Elegies: Meditations on the Art of Mourning (On Seeing)
Kimberly Juanita Brown
$19.95A poignant, unflinching study of black grief as a form of elegy found in visual art, music, literature—everywhere, if you know how to see it.
In Black Elegies, Kimberly Juanita Brown examines the form of the elegy and its unique capacity to convey the elongated grief borne of sustained racial violence. Structured around the sensorial, the book moves through sight, sound, and touch to reveal what Okwui Enwezor calls the “national emergency of black grief.” With her characteristic literary skill, Brown analyzes the work of major figures including Toni Morrison, Carrie Mae Weems, Audre Lorde, and Marvin Gaye, among others.
Brown contemplates recognizable sites of mourning: forced migration and enslavement, bodily violations, imprisonment and death. And she examines sites that do not register immediately as archives of grief: the landscape of southern U.S. slave plantations, a spontaneous street party, a quilt constructed out of the clothing worn by a loved one, a dance performance to hold the memory of history, and an aeolian harp installed at an institute of European art, among others. In this, the book offers a framework of mourning while black, within the parameters of contemporary artistic production. Brown asks: How do you mourn those you are not supposed to see? And where does the grief go? She shows us that grief is everywhere: “It spills out of photographs and modulates music. It hovers in the tenor and tone of cinematic performances. It resides in the body like an inspired concept, waiting for its articulation.”
- Original Sins: The (Mis)education of Black and Native Children and the Construction of American Racism
Original Sins: The (Mis)education of Black and Native Children and the Construction of American Racism
Eve L. Ewing
$32.00Why don’t our schools work? Eve L. Ewing tackles this question from a new angle: What if they’re actually doing what they were built to do? She argues that instead of being the great equalizer, America’s classrooms were designed to do the opposite: to maintain the nation’s inequalities. It’s a task at which they excel.
“This book will transform the way you see this country.”—Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow
If all children could just get an education, the logic goes, they would have the same opportunities later in life. But this historical tour de force makes it clear that the opposite is true: The U.S. school system has played an instrumental role in creating and upholding racial hierarchies, preparing children to expect unequal treatment throughout their lives.
In Original Sins, Ewing demonstrates that our schools were designed to propagate the idea of white intellectual superiority, to “civilize” Native students and to prepare Black students for menial labor. Education was not an afterthought for the Founding Fathers; it was envisioned by Thomas Jefferson as an institution that would fortify the country’s racial hierarchy. Ewing argues that these dynamics persist in a curriculum that continues to minimize the horrors of American history. The most insidious aspects of this system fall below the radar in the forms of standardized testing, academic tracking, disciplinary policies, and uneven access to resources.
By demonstrating that it’s in the DNA of American schools to serve as an effective and underacknowledged mechanism maintaining inequality in this country today, Ewing makes the case that we need a profound reevaluation of what schools are supposed to do, and for whom. This book will change the way people understand the place we send our children for eight hours a day. - (S)Kin
(S)Kin
Ibi Zoboi
Sold outFrom award-winning, New York Times bestselling author Ibi Zoboi comes her groundbreaking contemporary fantasy debut—a novel in verse based on Caribbean folklore—about the power of inherited magic and the price we must pay to live the life we yearn for.
“Our new home with its
thick walls and locked doors
wants me to stay trapped in my skin—
but I am fury and flame.”
Fifteen-year-old Marisol is the daughter of a soucouyant. Every new moon, she sheds her skin like the many women before her, shifting into a fireball witch who must fly into the night and slowly sip from the lives of others to sustain her own. But Brooklyn is no place for fireball witches with all its bright lights, shut windows, and bolt-locked doors.… While Marisol hoped they would leave their old traditions behind when they emigrated from the islands, she knows this will never happen while she remains ensnared by the one person who keeps her chained to her magical past—her mother.
Seventeen-year-old Genevieve is the daughter of a college professor and a newly minted older half sister of twins. Her worsening skin condition and the babies’ constant wailing keep her up at night, when she stares at the dark sky with a deep longing to inhale it all. She hopes to quench the hunger that gnaws at her, one that seems to reach for some memory of her estranged mother. When a new nanny arrives to help with the twins, a family secret connecting her to Marisol is revealed, and Gen begins to find answers to questions she hasn’t even thought to ask.
But the girls soon discover that the very skin keeping their flames locked beneath the surface may be more explosive to the relationships around them than any ancient magic.
- Casualties of Truth
Casualties of Truth
Lauren Francis-Sharma
$27.00From the author of Book of the Little Axe, nominated for the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and the critically acclaimed 'Til the Well Runs Dry, a riveting literary novel with the sharp edges of a thriller about the abuses of history and the costs of revenge, set between Washington, D.C., and Johannesburg, South Africa
Prudence Wright seems to have it all: a loving husband, Davis; a spacious home in Washington, D.C.; and the former glories of a successful career at McKinsey, which now enables her to dedicate her days to her autistic son, Roland. When she and Davis head out for dinner with one of Davis’s new colleagues on a stormy summer evening filled with startling and unwelcome interruptions, Prudence has little reason to think that certain details of her history might arise sometime between cocktails and the appetizer course.
Yet when Davis’s colleague turns out to be Matshediso, a man from Prudence’s past, she is transported back to the formative months she spent as a law student in South Africa in 1996. As an intern at a Johannesburg law firm, Prudence attended sessions of the Truth and Reconciliation hearings that uncovered the many horrors and human rights abuses of the Apartheid state, and which fundamentally shaped her sense of righteousness and justice. Prudence experienced personal horrors in South Africa as well, long hidden and now at risk of coming to light. When Matshediso finally reveals the real reason behind his sudden reappearance, he will force Prudence to examine her most deeply held beliefs and to excavate inner reserves of resilience and strength.
Lauren Francis-Sharma’s previous two novels have established her as a deft chronicler of history and its intersections with flawed humans struggling to find peace in unjust circumstances. With keen insight and gripping tension, Casualties of Truth explosively mines questions of whether we are ever truly able to remove the stains of our past and how we may attempt to reconcile with unquestionable wrongs.
- Soggy Like Cush Cush (A Picture Book Celebration of Creole Culture for Kids)
Soggy Like Cush Cush (A Picture Book Celebration of Creole Culture for Kids)
Karly Pierre
$18.99A gloomy, rainy day is turned upside down when Gran-moman takes Petite Marie on an adventure through town. Celebrate joy, Louisiana Creole culture, community, and the love of a wonderful grandparent in this gorgeous story about making every day count.
"Conveys the big power of small actions and the bolstering effect of community." Publisher's Weekly, Starred Review
"As Petite Marie moves around the town with her grandmother, their loving bond is expressed through all
their interactions." BooklistRain falls outside an old Louisiana Creole house until the ground is as soggy as a bowl of cush cush. Petite Marie thinks she's going to have to spend all day indoors, but Gran-moman takes Petite Marie on an unexpected journey around town. Soon, Petite Marie is having a magical day filled with friends, delicious Louisiana creole cooking, and a lot of care and kindness. With the help of Gran-moman she discovers that any day can be beautiful, no matter the weather.
- Losing Sight
Losing Sight
Tati Richardson
$17.99What if a mysterious pair of glasses helped you to see life—and love—clearly?
Sports reporter Tanika “Nikki” Ryan is at the top of her game until she isn’t. Squinting at the teleprompter and flubbing lines, she loses her coveted Thursday Night football spot to a younger, less qualified woman—and that’s only the start of her troubles. After her impaired sight leads to an accident nearly costing her life, Tanika finds herself in the office of handsome widowed optometrist Gideon Miles. There, mysterious circumstances lead Tanika to an enchanted pair of glasses, changing her world—and Gideon’s—forever. With help from her “boss chick village” and a bit of magic, Tanika finally learns to see the love that’s right in front of her eyes.
In this high-heat and hilarious rom-com that harkens to the golden age of Black romance, celebrated novelist Tati Richardson proves life is sweeter after age forty, and gives readers of all ages a reason to believe in second chances.
- Loca
Loca
Alejandro Heredia
$28.99If Junot Diaz’s critically acclaimed collection Drown and Janet Mock’s Emmy-winning series Pose produced offspring, Alejandro Heredia’s Loca would be their firstborn.
It’s 1999, and best friends Sal and Charo are striving to hold on to their dreams in a New York determined to grind them down. Sal is a book-loving science nerd trying to grow beyond his dead-end job in a new city, but he’s held back by tragic memories from his past in Santo Domingo. Free-spirited Charo is surprised to find herself a mother at twenty-five, partnered with a controlling man, working at the same supermarket for years, her world shrunk to the very domesticity she thought she’d escaped in her old country. When Sal finds love at a gay club one night, both his and Charo’s worlds unexpectedly open up to a vibrant social circle that pushes them to reckon with what they owe to their own selves, pasts, futures, and, always, each other.
Loca follows one daring year in the lives of young people living at the edge of their own patience and desires. With expansive grace, it reveals both the grueling conditions that force people to migrate and the possibility of friendship as home when family, nations, and identity groups fall short.
- Beauty in the Blood: A Novel
Beauty in the Blood: A Novel
Charlotte Carter
$18.00A curse rolls out over centuries, murky and unknowable as swamp waters, shaping and destroying lives.
Sarah Toomey is a successful young black lawyer, lovely but straitlaced– and afraid that she is losing her mind. Since the death of her mother, a force she can neither understand nor control is manipulating her memory and driving her to unexplained acts of violence and destruction. At the same time, Sarah is swept up in a highly charged relationship with a work colleague that portends a danger of its own. As she moves through her privileged life in New York, Sarah comes to learn how her past—her haunted history—is intertwined with America’s.
Yvonne Howard was born into the working class. Now, after years as a prison guard, she has reinvented herself. Her passion for cooking has landed her a position at a trendy soul food restaurant, and she is looking forward to a glamorous career. Then an ex-inmate named Bitty appears, demanding Yvonne’s help investigating her brother’s shocking death. Before long, Bitty too is dead, and Yvonne is pulled back into a world of ugly violence. Smart but unschooled, Yvonne finds herself in the unlikely role of detective: it is she who must unravel the dark and blood-soaked history that not only doomed Bitty and her brother, but also determined beautiful Sarah Toomey’s fate.
- Anansi: New & Ancient African Tales (Myths, Gods & Immortals)
Anansi: New & Ancient African Tales (Myths, Gods & Immortals)
Ivana Akotowaa Ofori, Emily Zobel Marshall, Ian Ableson, Benjamin Cyril Arthur, Bernice Arthur, Emmanuel Blavo, Bryoni Campbell, Sara Chisolm, Yazeed Dele-Azeez, A.L. Dawn French, Yeayi Kobina, Alina Mereșescu, Ella N’Diaye, Florence Onyango, Frances Pauli, Shruti Ramesh, Peter K. Rothe, and Chisom Umeh
$30.00Building on the popularity of mythological retellings, here's a new book, with new stories and a fascinating introduction to the enigmatic Anansi. A beautiful collectable edition.
Gorgeous collectable edition. Anansi is at once a creator god, a trickster folk hero, a wily spider and a heroic symbol of resistance. From his origins in West African folklore, to his lauded status in Jamaican culture, Anansi is a versatile immortal whose many stories reflect the early world of his origins, and the potential for re-imagination. Sometimes dark and chilling, occasionally light-hearted, but always lively and clever, Anansi appears in the lives of everyday folk, pricks the pomposity of the mighty and in this collection of new stories, appears in the modern and the ancient world, a symbol still of individuality and resilience, adapting to city life, with the undertow of ancient lore ever-present.
Introductory essay by Ivana Akotowaa Ofori, and foreword by Emily Zobel Marshall. The modern authors whose stories feature in this book are: Ian Ableson, Benjamin Cyril Arthur, Bernice Arthur, Emmanuel Blavo, Bryoni Campbell, Sara Chisolm, Yazeed Dele-Azeez, A.L. Dawn French, Yeayi Kobina, Alina Mereșescu, Ella N’Diaye, Florence Onyango, Frances Pauli, Shruti Ramesh, Peter K. Rothe, and Chisom Umeh.
About the series: Discover the mythology of humankind through its heroes, characters, gods and immortal figures. Myths, Gods & Immortals brings together the new and the ancient, familiar stories with a fresh and imaginative twist. Each book brings back to life a legendary, mythological or folkloric figure, with new stories alongside a comprehensive introduction which tells the original tales and emphasizes ancient and modern connections, tracing history and stories across continents, cultures and peoples. New and emerging writers from open submissions reveal hidden themes, casting fresh perspectives on well known stories, alongside the specially commissioned story of the origins and the cultural background from the era. The first titles are Medusa, Odin, Anansi and Circe.
- Unity and Struggle
Unity and Struggle
Amílcar Cabral, Michael Wolfers, and Basil Davidson
$20.99One of the world's greatest revolutionary leaders, Amílcar Cabral's long and arduous campaign for the liberation of Portuguese-dominated Africa is explored in this vivid compilation of his most influential speeches and writings.
Unity and Struggle is the compelling account of Amílcar Cabral's fight against imperialism, discrimination and injustice, as well as his progressive advocacy for religious toleration and gender equality – all of which combined to make him one of Africa's foremost political leaders.
Introduction by Basil Davidson.
'One of the most lucid and brilliant leaders in Africa' Fidel Castro
'Figures like Amílcar Cabral... helped us to imagine the horizons of freedom in far broader terms than were available to us through what we now call "civil rights discourse".' Angela Davis - New and Collected Hell: A Poem
New and Collected Hell: A Poem
Shane McCrae
$28.00Shane McCrae, “peer to the peerless” (New York Journal of Books), takes up and turns on its head the mantle of Dante in this contemporary vision of Hell.
Of death the muse is death the muse of Hell
Is death the muse of Heaven I don’t know
O muse of where howcan I hope to go
To where I pray I’ll go sing at least tellShane McCrae, one of the most prophetic and powerful poetic voices of our time, has created a twenty-first-century epic in New and Collected Hell. As David Woo wrote in Poetry, “McCrae’s poems allude to literary precursors like Dante, Milton, and the Bible, but the voice is unabashedly of our time . . . By seeking to heal the rift in his own identity, McCrae has listened intently to the literary echoes emanating from the English language and transmuted them through his own dynamic voice.” Here, he gathers new and previous work as a culmination of his long-standing poetic project: a new and unforgettable journey through Hell. McCrae’s work is indelible, and this collection brings his searing vision to new depths.
- A Perfect Day to Be Alone: A Novel
A Perfect Day to Be Alone: A Novel
Nanae Aoyama & Jesse Kirkwood
$15.99The English-language debut of a prize-winning Japanese author, this touching, subtly funny novel evokes the daily struggles and hopes of two women from different generations.
When her mother emigrates to China for work, 20-year-old Chizu moves in with 71-year-old Ginko, an eccentric distant relative, taking a room in her ramshackle Tokyo home, with its two resident cats and the persistent rattle of passing trains.
Living their lives in imperfect symmetry, they establish an uneasy alliance, stress tested by Chizu’s flashes of youthful spite. As the four seasons pass, Chizu navigates a series of tedious part-time jobs and unsatisfying relationships, before eventually finding her feet and salvaging a fierce independence from her solitude.
A Perfect Day to Be Alone is a moving, microscopic examination of loneliness and heartbreak. With flashes of deadpan humor and a keen eye for poignant detail, Aoyama chronicles the painful process of breaking free from the moorings of youth.
- Talk to Me: Lessons from a Family Forged by History
Talk to Me: Lessons from a Family Forged by History
Rich Benjamin
$29.00A piercingly powerful memoir, a grandson’s account of the coup that ended his grandfather's presidency of Haiti, the secrecy that shrouded that wound within his family, and his urgent efforts to know his mother despite the past.
“A brilliant, absorbing book...I couldn’t stop reading.” —Salman Rushdie, author of Knife
Rich Benjamin’s mother, Danielle Fignolé, grew up the eldest in a large family living a comfortable life in Port-au-Prince. Her mother was a schoolteacher, her father a populist hero—a labor leader and politician. The first true champion of the black masses, he eventually became the country’s president in 1957. But two weeks after his inauguration, that life was shattered. Soldiers took Danielle’s parents at gunpoint and put them on a plane to New York, a coup hatched by the Eisenhower administration. Danielle and her siblings were kidnapped, and ultimately smuggled out of the country.
Growing up, Rich knew little of this. No one in his family spoke of it. He didn’t know why his mother struggled with emotional connection, why she was so erratic, so quick to anger. And she, in turn, knew so little about him, about the emotional pain he moved through as a child, the physical agony from his blood disease, while coming to terms with his sexuality at the dawn of the AIDS crisis. For all that they could talk about—books, learning, world events—the deepest parts of themselves remained a mystery to one another, a silence that, the older Rich got, the less he could bear.
It would take Rich years to piece together the turmoil that carried forward from his grandfather, to his mother, to him, and then to bring that story to light. In Talk to Me, he doesn’t just paint the portrait of his family, but a bold, pugnacious portrait of America—of the human cost of the country’s hostilities abroad, the experience of migrants on these shores, and how the indelible ties of family endure through triumph and loss, from generation to generation.
- Frenemies with Benefits (Peachtree Cove, 3)
Frenemies with Benefits (Peachtree Cove, 3)
Synithia Williams
$18.99You can’t keep a sizzling little secret in a town like Peachtree Cove…
For a place that just won an award for Best Small Town, Peachtree Cove sure has a big rumor mill. And Tracey Thompson is tired of being at the center of it. She’s worked hard to make her bed-and-breakfast a success—only to have her soon-to-be ex’s very public affair with her business partner result in a shocking pregnancy…and the biggest scandal around.
If the whole town is going to talk no matter what she does, maybe it’s time that Tracey stopped trying to be perfect. Maybe she should start doing things for herself—like having a little fun. And Brian Nelson, the sexy nursery owner who supplies plants for all her special events, is more than willing to help.
Fresh out of a bad marriage, Brian is done with drama. Ever since high school, he’s admired Tracey’s strength and sass, and a friends with benefits deal sounds perfect. But now everyone in Peachtree Cove is talking. And they can all see what Brian and Tracey don’t want to admit, even to themselves…that nothing complicates a simple arrangement quite like love…
Peachtree Cove
Book 1: The Secret to a Southern Wedding
Book 2: Waiting for Friday Night
Book 3: Frenemies with Benefits - People of Means: A Novel
People of Means: A Novel
Nancy Johnson
$30.00From the acclaimed author of The Kindest Lie, a propulsive novel about a mother and daughter each seeking justice and following their dreams during moments of social reckoning—1960s Nashville and 1992 Chicago; perfect for readers of Brit Bennett and Tayari Jones.
"People of Means left me breathless! A beautifully crafted story...profound and sharp."—Sadeqa Johnson New York Times bestselling author of The House of Eve
Two women. Two pivotal moments. One dream for justice and equality.
In the fall of 1959, Freda Gilroy arrives on the campus of Fisk University full of hope, carrying a suitcase and the voice of her father telling her she’s part of a family legacy of greatness. Soon, the ugliness of the Jim Crow South intrudes, and she’s thrust into a movement for social change. Freda is reluctant to get involved, torn between a soon-to-be doctor her parents approve of and an audacious young man willing to risk it all in the name of justice. Freda finds herself caught between two worlds, and two loves, and must decide how much she’s willing to sacrifice for the advancement of her people.
In 1992 Chicago, Freda’s daughter Tulip is an ambitious PR professional on track for an exciting career, if workplace politics and racial microaggressions don’t get in her way. But with the ruling in the Rodney King trial weighing heavily on her, Tulip feels called to action. When she makes an irreversible professional misstep as she seeks to uplift her community, she must decide, just like her mother had three decades prior, what she’s willing to risk in the name of justice and equality.
Insightful, evocative, and richly imagined with stories of hidden history, People of Means is an emotional tour de force that offers a glimpse into the quest for racial equality, the pursuit of personal and communal success, and the power of love and family ties.
"A memorable story of mothers and daughters, family dynamics, the complicated meaning of success, the pull of love, and the fight for racial equality, People of Means is a timely look at who we are as a nation—and who we can become, if only we have the courage to follow our hearts." —Kristin Harmel, New York Times bestselling author of The Paris Daughter
- Becoming a Ballerina: The Story of Michaela Mabinty DePrince
Becoming a Ballerina: The Story of Michaela Mabinty DePrince
Laura Obuobi and Olivia Duchess
$19.99From Laura Obuobi, acclaimed author of NAACP Image Award nominee Black Gold and What Love Looks Like, comes a triumphant nonfiction picture book about ballet star Michaela Mabinty DePrince, one of the most celebrated ballerinas of our generation. This lyrical true tale follows her childhood, from Sierra Leone orphan to world famous dancer.
In a Sierra Leone dust storm, ballet swooped into Michaela Mabinty DePrince’s life and never let her go. After her adoption brought her to the United States, ballet continued to be the consoling hand that guided Michaela, filling her with joy and hope. Over time, Michaela’s love for ballet only grew, and with it her dream of becoming a professional dancer.
However, there were peers who told Michaela she didn’t belong in the ballet world, that her skin and vitiligo made her too different. But ballet had stirred in Michaela a faith and determination that would help her turn her dreams into a reality.
From the acclaimed author of NAACP Image Award nominee Black Gold and What Love Looks Like, Laura Obuobi, and artist Olivia Duchess comes a lyrical and heartwarming picture book about one of the most influential ballerinas of our generation, inspiring all of us to never give up on our dreams.
- Isaac's Song: A Novel
Isaac's Song: A Novel
Daniel Black
$28.00The beloved author of Don’t Cry for Me and Perfect Peace returns with a poignant, emotionally exuberant novel about a young queer Black man finding his voice in 1980s Chicago—a novel of family, forgiveness and perseverance, for fans of The Great Believers and On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
Isaac is at a crossroads in his young life. Growing up in Missouri, the son of a caustic, hard-driving father, he was conditioned to suppress his artistic pursuits and physical desires, notions that didn’t align with a traditional view of masculinity. But now, in late ’80s Chicago, Isaac has finally carved out a life of his own. He is sensitive and tenderhearted and has built up the courage to seek out a community. Yet just as he begins to embrace who he is, two social catalysts—the AIDS crisis and Rodney King’s attack—collectively extinguish his hard-earned joy.
At a therapist’s encouragement, Isaac begins to write down his story. In the process, he taps into a creative energy that will send him on a journey back to his family, his ancestral home in Arkansas and the inherited trauma of the nation’s dark past. But a surprise discovery will either unlock the truths he’s seeking or threaten to derail the life he’s fought so hard to claim.
Poignant, sweeping and luminously told, Isaac's Song is a return to the beloved characters of Don’t Cry for Me and a high-water mark in the career of an award-winning author.
- Permanent Record
Permanent Record
by Naima Yael Tokunow
$22.95A visionary anthology that examines and reimagines the archive as a form of collective record-keeping, featuring work by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Douglas Kearney, Brenda Shaughnessy, Mahogany L. Brown, and many new and emerging voices.
Inspired by Naima Yael Tokunow’s research into the Black American record (and its purposeful scarceness), Permanent Recordasks, what do we gain when we engage with our flawed cultural systems of remembrance? How does questioning and creating a deep relationship to the archive, and in some cases, spinning thread from air where there is none, allow us to prefigure the world that we want? Including reflections on identity and language, diasporic and first generation lived experiences, and responses to the ways the record upholds harm and provides incomplete understandings, Permanent Record hopes to reframe what gets to be a part of collective remembrance, exploring “possibilities for speculating beyond recorded multiplicity.”
- Tsunami: Women’s Voices from Mexico
Tsunami: Women’s Voices from Mexico
by Heather Cleary, Gabriela Jauregui, Julia Sanches, Diana J. Torres, Sara Uribe, and Zapatista Army for National Liberation
$25.95Merging waves of feminist thought from established and emerging Mexican women writers, Tsunami arrives with seismic, groundbreaking force.
Featuring personal essay, manifesto, creative nonfiction, and poetry, Tsunami gathers the multiplicity of voices being raised in Mexico today against patriarchy and its buried structures. Tackling gender violence, community building, #MeToo, Indigenous rights, and more, these writings rock the core of what we know feminism to be, dismantling its Eurocentric roots and directing its critical thrust towards current affairs in Mexico today. Asserting plurality as a political priority, Tsunami includes trans voices, Indigenous voices, Afro-Latinx voices, voices from within and outside academic institutions, and voices spanning generations. Tsunami is the combined force and critique of the three feminist waves, the marea verde (“green wave”) of protests that have swept through Latin America in recent years, and the tides turned by insurgent feminisms at the margins of public discourse.
Contributors include Marina Azahua, Yásnaya Elena Aguilar Gil, Dahlia de la Cerda, Lia García, Margo Glantz, Jimena González, Fernanda Latani M. Bravo, Valeria Luiselli, Ytzel Maya, Brenda Navarro, Jumko Ogata, Daniela Rea, Cristina Rivera Garza, Diana J. Torres, Sara Uribe, and the Zapatista Army for National Liberation.
- Ibis: A Novel
Ibis: A Novel
by Justin Haynes
Sold outA bold, witty, magical new voice in fiction, Justin Haynes weaves a cross-generational Caribbean story of migration, superstition, and a search for family in the novel Ibis.
There is bad luck in New Felicity. The people of the small coastal village have taken in Milagros, an 11-year-old Venezuelan refugee, just as Trinidad’s government has begun cracking down on undocumented migrants—and now an American journalist has come to town asking questions.
New Felicity’s superstitious fishermen fear the worst, certain they’ve brought bad luck on the village by killing a local witch who had herself murdered two villagers the year before. The town has been plagued since her death by alarming visits from her supernatural mother, as well as by a mysterious profusion of scarlet ibis birds.
Skittish that the reporter’s story will bring down the wrath of the ministry of national security, the fishermen take things into their own hands. From there, we go backward and forward in time—from the town’s early days, when it was the site of a sugar plantation, to Milagros’s adulthood as she searches for her mother across the Americas. In between, through the voices of a chorus of narrators, we glimpse moments from various villagers’ lives, each one setting into motion events that will reverberate outwards across the novel and shape Milagros’s fate.
With kinetic, absorbing language and a powerful sense of voice, Ibis meditates on the bond between mothers and daughters, both highlighting the migrant crisis that troubles the contemporary world and offering a moving exploration of how to square where we come from with who we become.
- The Nature of Love
The Nature of Love
Toni Shiloh
$18.99A doctor feeling fractured
Dr. Erykah Kennedy, a renowned orthopedic surgeon, finds herself at a crossroads in life. At forty-one, she's achieved remarkable success in her career, yet when it comes to her love life, she feels hopeless. But when she meets Christian Gamble, a passionate wildlife conservationist, an unexpected bond forms between them despite their contrasting worlds.
A wildlife enthusiast ready for more
Chris has yet to find someone to share his adventures with, but as his friendship with Erykah starts to blossom, he begins falling for her in every way. When tragedy strikes and Erykah suddenly becomes guardian to her nieces, Chris helps her pick up the pieces.
Two hearts destined by nature
With their lives turned upside down, finding their way to a lasting love while putting their faith in God may be the biggest challenge they've ever faced.
"She's a master of modern-day fairy tales, pairing a relatable heroine and a dreamy, honor-bound hero. This faith-forward romantic comedy is . . . a pleasant reward for readers looking for a true happily ever after."--JANINE ROSCHE, bestselling author, on The Love Script
The Nature of Love is a clean, African American contemporary romance with themes of friends to lovers and the healing power of love. This heartfelt happily-ever-after tale is the series finale of Shiloh's beloved Love in the Spotlight novels.
- Harlem Rhapsody
Harlem Rhapsody
Victoria Christopher Murray
$29.00“A page turner and history lesson at once, Harlem Rhapsody reminds us that our stories are our generational wealth— this book and the real lives that inspired it.”—Tayari Jones, New York Times bestselling author of An American Marriage (Oprah’s Book Club Pick)
She found the literary voices that would inspire the world…. The extraordinary story of the woman who ignited the Harlem Renaissance, written by Victoria Christopher Murray, New York Times bestselling coauthor of The Personal Librarian.
In 1919, a high school teacher from Washington, D.C arrives in Harlem excited to realize her lifelong dream. Jessie Redmon Fauset has been named the literary editor of The Crisis. The first Black woman to hold this position at a preeminent Negro magazine, Jessie is poised to achieve literary greatness. But she holds a secret that jeopardizes it all.
W. E. B. Du Bois, the founder of The Crisis, is not only Jessie’s boss, he’s her lover. And neither his wife, nor their fourteen-year-age difference can keep the two apart. Amidst rumors of their tumultuous affair, Jessie is determined to prove herself. She attacks the challenge of discovering young writers with fervor, finding sixteen-year-old Countee Cullen, seventeen-year-old Langston Hughes, and Nella Larsen, who becomes one of her best friends. Under Jessie’s leadership, The Crisis thrives…every African American writer in the country wants their work published there.
When her first novel is released to great acclaim, it’s clear that Jessie is at the heart of a renaissance in Black music, theater, and the arts. She has shaped a generation of literary legends, but as she strives to preserve her legacy, she’ll discover the high cost of her unparalleled success. - The Love Lyric (The Greene Sisters)
The Love Lyric (The Greene Sisters)
Kristina Forest
$19.00An R&B singer and a corporate executive find love that hits the right notes in this romance by Kristina Forest, USA Today bestselling author of The Partner Plot.
Iris Greene used to be a woman with a plan. But all of that changed after she met the love of her life at twenty-five, got pregnant and married…and then became a widow and a single mother all in alittle over two years. Now, after years of hustling, Iris is the director of partnerships at a beauty company and raising sweet six-year-old Calla by herself. Despite her busy life, she still can’t help but feel lonely. She just needs to catch her breath—and one night, at her sister’s wedding, when she steps outside to do just that, she sees a certain singer who takes her breath away. . . .
By all accounts, pop R&B singer Angel Hughes has it made. He’s a successful musician and has just scored a brand ambassador deal with an emerging beauty company. But he’s still not fulfilled; he’s not producing songs he’s passionate about, and there’s a gaping hole in his love life. When he visits the Save Face Beauty office to kickstart his campaign, he’s delighted to see Iris, his stylist’s sister—the beautiful woman he’s secretly had a crush on for years.
Despite their obvious attraction to each other, they must stay professional throughout the campaign tour—a goal that doesn’t quite pan out. But when it becomes clear their lives aren’t in sync, can they fall back in step to the same rhythm and beat?
"Kristina Forest’s Green Sisters series blends swoonworthy romantic moments with a healthy dose of sisterly bonding and a dash of glitz and glamor. Each book is a well-rounded treat."—Alexis Daria, bestselling author of You Had Me at Hola
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