A Millions Most Anticipated 2026 Selection

"This is poetry of the highest order, and a stunning reminder of what words can do.”—Omar El Akkad

"Hold this book, read every word, study every picture, notice the prints you leave behind—a reminder that no one’s hands are clean."—Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Freedom Dreams

From National Book Award Finalist Fady Joudah, a collection of poems, essays, and photographs that offers a Palestinian representation of not only the staggering grief, but the unwavering resilience and prevailing life force of a people and place enduring genocide.  

Fady Joudah writes from the split perspective of a Palestinian American physician caring for the sick while watching the destruction of Gaza from the United States, a nation complicit in that destruction. He locates the paradox of his position everywhere: in the seed a sparrow eats from his proffered hand; in his writing in English, the oppressor’s language; in the faces of Palestinian children receiving meals from aid kitchens—a glimpse into what his life could have been, and what is being lost in a war disproportionately impacting children and their families. Throughout the book, beauty insists on its survival not only through the Palestinian people, but also through the nonhuman world in which he takes occasional refuge from the devastation that humanity brings upon itself.

By placing before readers a series of carefully chosen images from Gaza, Joudah presses his reader to comprehend that the experience of both the individual and the whole are integral to an explicitly Palestinian understanding of genocide, even if that rendering is a nearly impossible endeavor. Exhibit G insists on the immensity of Palestinian interiority, and finds in this collective act of creation a hyper-present awareness. “By claiming what is being actively erased,” Joudah writes, “I become presence.”

At once an indictment of genocide, a rendering of catastrophic loss, and “an affirmation of life instead of a staging of death” (Katherine Larson), Exhibit G insists that love exists in all its variousness, and that it is the only defense against a totalizing, destructive force.

How medieval-inspired racial feudalism reigned in early America and was challenged by Black liberal thinkers

Though the United States has been heralded as a beacon of democracy, many nineteenth-century Americans viewed their nation through the prism of the Old World. What they saw was a racially stratified country that reflected not the ideals of a modern republic but rather the remnants of feudalism. American Dark Age reveals how defenders of racial hierarchy embraced America’s resemblance to medieval Europe and tells the stories of the abolitionists who exposed it as a glaring blemish on the national conscience.

Against those seeking to maintain what Frederick Douglass called an “aristocracy of the skin,” Keidrick Roy shows how a group of Black thinkers, including Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Hosea Easton, and Harriet Jacobs, challenged the medievalism in their midst—and transformed the nation’s founding liberal tradition. He demonstrates how they drew on spiritual insight, Enlightenment thought, and a homegrown political philosophy that gave expression to their experiences at the bottom of the American social order. Roy sheds new light on how Black abolitionist writers and activists worked to eradicate the pernicious ideology of racial feudalism from American liberalism and renew the country’s commitment to values such as individual liberty, social progress, and egalitarianism.

American Dark Age reveals how the antebellum Black liberal tradition holds vital lessons for us today as hate groups continue to align themselves with fantasies of a medieval past and openly call for a return of all-powerful monarchs, aristocrats, and nobles who rule by virtue of their race.

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.

A groundbreaking guide to understanding-and transforming-the psychological impact of being Black in America.

Despite centuries of systemic trauma, Black communities continue to demonstrate unmatched resilience, creativity, and strength. Yet the emotional burden of navigating race, identity, and survival in modern America remains one of the most overlooked public health issues of our time.

Healing While Black offers a compelling, research-informed look at how trauma shows up-and how to heal from it. Combining modern psychology, historical analysis, and culturally grounded practices, this book provides a practical roadmap for improving mental health, building resilience, and strengthening overall well-being.

Inside, readers will learn:

* How generational trauma affects the brain, body, and behavior
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* The psychological effects of racism and systemic inequity
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* Evidence-based tools for emotional regulation and stress recovery
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* Culturally relevant healing practices backed by science
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* How to transform personal healing into empowerment and legacy
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Engaging, accessible, and deeply relevant, this book is designed for individuals, families, educators, therapists, and organizations committed to supporting Black mental health.

Whether you're looking to understand your own healing, support a loved one, or build healthier communities, this book delivers clear insights and actionable strategies for long-lasting change.

This work reminds you of one truth: Healing is your birthright - and reclaiming it is revolutionary.

‘I may pay rent to a friend for my place in Greensboro, but the South’s my landlord; and I’m trapped in its stomach trying to get to its brain. Here, I see butterflies with Confederate flag-grown wings and minstrel vestiges of Daddy Rice collecting dough. I can’t move because I’m stuck in Aunt Jemima’s syrup.’ Spell, Time, Practice, American, Body is the highly anticipated first book by artist, filmmaker, and writer RaMell Ross. Bringing together Ross’s large-format photographs, sculptures, conceptual works, and selected films, together with illuminating texts by Ross and a host of writers, this ambitious publication presents a chronicle of the American South that is both mysterious and quotidian, a historical document and a radical imagining of the future. The book opens with a series of illuminating colour photographs from Hale County, Alabama, Ross’s adoptive home and the setting of his Academy Award-nominated documentary Hale County This Morning, This Evening (2018). It then moves through a series of photographic and mixed-media works and writings that examine, deconstruct, and rewrite visual representations of the South. Amidst these works, at the book’s heart, is Ross’s film Return to Origin, a remarkable conceptual work in which Ross freight ships himself in a 4x8-foot box – a nod to Henry Brown who shipped himself to freedom in 1849. With Spell, Time, Practice, American, Body, Ross creates a new visual narrative of the South, freed from its iconic meanings to reveal the earth, dirt, soil, and land beneath. With texts by RaMell Ross, Tracy K. Smith, Richard McCabe, and Scott Matthews

A primer on intersectional environmentalism aimed at educating the next generation of activists on how to create meaningful, inclusive, and sustainable change. 
 
The Intersectional Environmentalist is an introduction to the intersection between environmentalism, racism, and privilege, and an acknowledgment of the fundamental truth that we cannot save the planet without uplifting the voices of its people -- especially those most often unheard. Written by Leah Thomas, a prominent voice in the field and the activist who coined the term "Intersectional Environmentalism," this book is simultaneously a call to action, a guide to instigating change for all, and a pledge to work towards the empowerment of all people and the betterment of the planet. 

In The Intersectional Environmentalist, Thomas shows how not only are Black, Indigenous and people of color unequally and unfairly impacted by environmental injustices, but she argues that the fight for the planet lies in tandem to the fight for civil rights; and in fact, that one cannot exist without the other. An essential read, this book addresses the most pressing issues that the people and our planet face, examines and dismantles privilege, and looks to the future as the voice of a movement that will define a generation. 

A centennial celebration of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and its vital role in the development of Black Studies

In 1926, the Afro-Puerto Rican bibliophile Arturo Schomburg's collection of four thousand books, pamphlets, papers, and prints arrived at the 135th Street branch of the New York Public Library. The collection contained works in many languages and formats, offering an unparalleled look into the richness and global reach of Black history. One hundred years later, Schomburg's collection remains a central feature of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, now the world's premier archive for study of the African diaspora, housing more than 11 million items, and a vibrant site of Black intellectual life.

This volume not only contextualizes the life and work of Schomburg and chronicles the history of the institution that bears his name but also includes a list of books and pamphlets in Schomburg's initial "seed collection," the fruit of a multiyear research effort to reconstruct this early Black Studies archive. Framing this list are essays and reflections written by an interdisciplinary group of scholars on the development of the Black intellectual tradition, both in Schomburg's time and today.

Haitian Vodou is a fascinating spiritual tradition rich with ceremonies and magic, songs and prayers, dances and fellowship. Yet outside of Haiti, next to no one understands this joyous and profound way of life. ln Haitian Vodou, Mambo Chita Tann explores the historical roots and contemporary practices of this unique tradition, including discussions of:

* Customs, beliefs, sacred spaces, and ritual objects
* Characteristics and behaviors of the Lwa, the spirits served by Vodou practitioners
* Common misconceptions such as "voodoo dolls" and the zombie phenomenon
* Questions and answers for attending ceremonies and getting involved in a sosyete (Vodou house)
* Correspondence tables, Kreyol glossary, supplemental prayer texts, and an extensive list of reference books and online resources

Well-researched, comprehensive, and engaging, Haitian Vodou will be a welcome addition for people new to Haitian spirituality as well as for students, practitioners, and academics.

The New York Times bestselling author of Begin Again confronts America’s unfinished story in this blistering reassessment of race, freedom, and the myths that bind us.

Celebrated public intellectual Eddie S. Glaude, Jr. presents a groundbreaking analysis of the vicious cycles of American history and the country’s enduring refusal to face its true nature—especially at the moments when national anniversaries steer us back toward the mythology meant to disguise the truth.

America, U.S.A., deliberately formulated and beautifully written, details a heart-wrenching exploration of America’s legacy. It is a magnificently complex combination of lessons and voices—from W.E.B. DuBois and John Dos Passos to Herman Melville and Martin Luther King, Jr.—that, together, paint a sprawling and honest tableau of the United States, its complicated past, and ever more tenuous future. Glaude’s is a powerful voice of conscience in our tumultuous world. He pulls no punches, calling on us to interrogate our conceptions of innocence and freedom and the stories we tell ourselves about our past and present.

Centered around the major celebrations of America’s milestone birthdays across 250 years of history, the book offers a riveting look at the battles over who has a stake in writing the American story. Devastatingly candid, profoundly moving, and deeply reflective, America, U.S.A. is a shining meditation on how we must reckon with a grim past in order to strive for the better angels of our future.

The second book in a three-volume series on Black American artists, featuring work from the 1950s to the 1970s that responded to the cultural, political, and social concerns of the era

During the turbulent 1950s to 1970s, Black American artists, responding to increasing civil rights activism, challenged inequities in the art world. Artists created works that celebrated their racial identity, connected with Black audiences, and participated in the struggle for political, economic, and social equality. The establishment of artist collectives, such as Spiral, and museums devoted to Black art, including the Studio Museum in Harlem, alongside the emergence of art historians and critics such as David Driskell and Linda Goode Bryant, marked early steps to bring Black art into broader artistic discourse.
 
The book features 140 color illustrations of paintings, sculptures, and works on paper by such celebrated artists as Romare Bearden, Sam Gilliam, Jacob Lawrence, Norman Lewis, Howardena Pindell, and Alma Thomas, as well as by under-recognized artists. Essays provide an overview of the period and in-depth examinations of James A. Porter, an artist and art historian credited with establishing the field of African American art history, and Merton D. Simpson, an abstract painter, member of the Spiral group, and one of the most important dealers of African art in the United States.

Published in association with the Dixon Gallery and Gardens

Exhibition Schedule:

Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis
(October 22, 2023–January 14, 2024)
 
Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento
(February 4–May 19, 2024)