“This is a tender, deeply perceptive tale of what kin owes kin, and how we might work to mend old wounds together.”—Elle

In this stunning debut novel, four generations of complex Black women contend with motherhood and daughterhood, generational trauma and the deeply ingrained tensions and wounds that divide them as they redefine happiness and healing for themselves.

Erudite Evelyn, her cynical daughter Charlotte, and Charlotte’s optimistic daughter Corinna see the world very differently. Though they love each other deeply, it’s no wonder that their personalities often clash. But their conflicts go deeper than run-of-the-mill disagreements. Here, there is deep, dark resentment for past and present hurt.  

When Corinna gives birth to her own daughter, Camille, the beautiful, intelligent little girl offers this trio of mothers something they all need: hope, joy, and an opportunity to reconcile. They decide to work together to raise their collective daughter with the tenderness and empathy they missed in their own relationships. Yet despite their best intentions, they cannot agree on what that means.

After Camille eventually leaves her mother and grandmother in rural Tennessee for a more cosmopolitan life in Washington, DC with her great-grandmother, it’s unclear whether this complex and self-contained girl will thrive or be overwhelmed by the fears and dreams of three generations she carries. As she grows into a gutsy young woman, Camille must decide for herself what happiness will look like.

 In masterful, elegant prose, debut novelist Sarai Johnson has created a rich and moving portrait of Black women’s lives today.

NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2025・BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR - Washington Independent Review of Books

“A gorgeous novel.”—New York Times

“A revealing, history-infused novel that spills its tale with the eager breathlessness, wry commentary, and frank truths of a close friend...Bélem…transforms little-known history into an exquisite ode.”—The Christian Science Monitor

Set in the 19th-century on Réunion Island, this new novel by International Booker Prize-longlisted author, Gaëlle Bélem, tells the true story of Edmond Albius, a young Creole boy whose extraordinary talent for botany leads him to revolutionize the highly competitive vanilla industry. Here is the incredible hidden story of a beloved flavor wrapped in a tale about resilience, science, exploration, defiance, and desert! Told with great verve and perfect pitch, The Rarest Fruit is both a poignant tribute to the unsung heroes of history and a vivid portrayal of the many destinies that may be shaped by a single discovery.

★ “Belem’s piercing bildungsroman memorializes Edmond while filling in the gaps with a masterful balance of humor, tragedy, and emotional insight. It’s an impressive feat.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

A floundering twenty-something, who’s sworn off romance finds herself roped into her meddling sister’s matchmaking business—in this sparkling debut rom-com that asks: can we protect ourselves while falling in love?

Kaia Harper may not have a plan for her life, but she knows what she won't be doing—falling for somebody's dusty son, promising forever. She'd rather spend the summer after college having disappointing one-night stands and watching crime show reruns. At least she won’t be caught off guard since she already knows how all those stories end.

But when her very pregnant and newly single sister calls for help, Kaia reroutes, stumbling back home to suburban Connecticut…and into the business plan of her sister's new matchmaking company. Kaia’s views on love remain as bleak as her career prospects, but if becoming the inaugural client can distract her from existential questions like "What am I even doing with my life?", Kaia can suffer through a few bad dates and call it a favor.

When Ro Jackson finds Kaia stalled on the side of the road, he isn’t put off by her attitude. His steady disposition is Kaia’s opposite and makes him exactly what she needs—a friend in town who can handle her just as she is. But as Ro talks Kaia through a summer of failed matches, she finds herself drawn to more than just his poetic outlook and friendship.

Kaia hadn’t seen this one coming, but as she and Ro grow closer, she’ll have to decide what’s more important: needing to know the end of every story, or jumping into the unknown.

Here are over 800 haiku by Richard Wright, one of the early forceful and eloquent spokesmen for black Americans, author of the acclaimed Native Son and Black Boy.

Wright discovered the haiku in the last eighteen months of life. He attempted to capture, through his sensibility as an African-American, the elusive Zen discipline and beauty in depicting man’s relationship, not only to his fellow man as he had in the raw and forceful prose of his fiction, but to the natural world. In all, he wrote over 4,000 haiku.

Here are the 817 he personally chose; Wright’s haiku, disciplined and steeped in beauty, display a universality that transcends both race and color without ever denying them. Wright wrote his haiku obsessively—in bed, in cafes, in restaurants, in both Paris and the French countryside. They offered him a new form of expression and a new vision: with the threat of death constantly before him, he found in them inspiration, beauty, and insights.

Fighting illness and frequently bedridden, deeply upset by the recent loss of his mother, Ella, Wright continued, as his daughter notes in her introduction, “to spin these poems of light out of the gathering darkness.”

The widow of a tech mogul is determined to give her wealth away—and keep one secret from the journalist tasked with telling her story. A hot new take on the billionaire romance.

When Ndidi Davis’s husband unexpectedly dies, she’s left bereft—and with $2.1 billion in the bank. She channels her grief into launching a charitable foundation, but the endeavor is made more complicated by Geoffrey Campbell, an ambitious, perceptive journalist assigned to profile her philanthropic pursuit. Geoffrey’s reporting slowly uncovers Ndidi’s whole heart—and some parts of her past she’s worked hard to keep out of the public eye.

The definitive early-career survey of one of the most compelling photographers of his generation.

Tyler Mitchell’s photography is animated by dreams of paradise and joy against the backdrop of history. Since his rise to prominence in the worlds of art and fashion, Mitchell has created images of beauty, utopia, and the American landscape that expand the imaginary of Blackness in the twenty-first century. Wish This Was Real is the definitive early-career survey of Mitchell’s work, offering a comprehensive look into the subjects driving his artistic practice, from his genre-bending portraits made in the United States, Europe, and West Africa to his photographs printed on diaphanous fabrics and sculptures that reference Black intellectual heritage. Presenting new perspectives by leading writers on his long-standing themes of self-determination and the extraordinary radiance of the everyday, Wish This Was Real shows how photography can be rooted in a collective past while evoking imagined futures.

She thought she left Houston behind.

Spring Greene built a successful life far from the city that once held her heart. Far from the memories. Far from the mistakes.

And far from Preston Cole.

But when a family tragedy pulls her back home, Spring finds herself face-to-face with the one man she never truly forgot.

Preston is no longer the ambitious young musician she once knew. He's a superstar with a complicated past, a loyal fanbase, and wounds of his own.

The years may have changed everything around them.

But not the way they look at each other.

As old feelings reignite, Spring must confront the questions she's spent years avoiding:

What happens when your first love returns?

Can two people find their way back to each other after years apart?

And can love survive the secrets, grief, and unfinished business waiting in Houston?

Filled with music, friendship, heartbreak, healing, and unforgettable chemistry, Spring: A Love Story is an emotional second-chance romance about the people who leave fingerprints on your soul—and the courage it takes to love them again.

Perfect for readers who enjoy:

• Second Chance Romance
• Black Romance
• Friends-to-Lovers Romance
• Emotional Contemporary Romance
• Music Industry Romance
• Strong Family Relationships
• Stories of Healing and Hope

Because some love stories don't end.

They wait.

A Norian Love Experience

When the final page ends, the story continues.

Spring: A Love Story includes an original companion soundtrack inspired by the novel's characters, emotions, and unforgettable moments.

Step into Spring Greene's world. Experience the music that shaped Preston Cole's journey. Discover the songs behind the story.

Because some stories deserve to be read.

And heard.

Experience the novel. Hear the soundtrack. Enter the season.

The incredible journey of activist Opal Lee—known as the Grandmother of Juneteenth—is brought to life in this biographical graphic novel that not only explores Opal’s remarkable path, but the history of the holiday of Juneteenth itself.

From the 1860s to Ms. Opal’s childhood home, from her years as a teacher to the White House, First Freedom: The Story of Opal Lee and Juneteenth seeks to give readers an insight into the history behind one of the central figures in the creation of America’s newest federal holiday, Juneteenth.

Born in 1926, Opal Lee grew up in a racially divided America and dedicated her life to overcoming the obstacles presented therein. A lifelong educator, Ms. Opal has been a community activist all her life, and would take on the movement to celebrate and commemorate Juneteenth not just as a holiday, but as a symbol of comprehensive freedom for all people.

Ms. Opal’s life personifies the fight for everyday freedom that leads to lasting change. As the Grandmother of Juneteenth says, “There is so much more to do.”

Written by acclaimed journalist, producer, and author Angélique Roché (My Super Hero is Black) and drawn by a trio of talented artists—including Alvin Epps (I Survived Hurricane Katrina, 2005: A Graphic Novel), Bex Glendining (the upcoming Indigo Port), and rising star Millicent Monroe—The First Freedom: The Story of Opal Lee and Juneteenth promises to illuminate the life of a singular woman and the history of a momentous holiday, with additional back matter providing more insights into Juneteenth’s history and the making of this graphic novel tribute.

“Outrageously creative! Kids will drink in every imaginative detail in El Toro’s wild world!” —Jeff Kinney, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series

From the Eisner Award Nominated World of ¡Vamos! series, Tough Times finds everyone’s favorite young luchador fighting a losing streak in an action-packed, graphic-novel-style El Toro & Friends paper-over-board reader by New York Times bestselling, three-time Pura Belpré Award–winning author-illustrator Raúl the Third.

The rookie Kid Toro hasn’t won a match in a long time. He loses to every wrestler he fights, from Al “the Crane” Scorpio to Prickly Pear to Burrobot. It feels like he’ll never win again!

Luckily, his coach, Ricky Raton, won’t let him give up so easily. As he reminds his young fighter what he does best, Kid Toro starts to realize that, when you get knocked down, getting back up makes all the difference.

Tackling Spanish phrases and packed full of humor, these Eisner-nominated early reader graphic novels are essential for readers who want an action-packed story and lots of laughs.

For more fun with El Toro & Friends, check out:

* Tag Team
* Tacos Today
* Team Up
* Training Day

Set in what may be the future, and centered on six women sharing a space in some sort of crumbling apartment tower, Ruins, Child is remarkable for its irresistible sweep, wit, and prickly splintered truth. Like a precious old mirror that's been dropped, it's a book that is looking up at you, flashing light and bits of the undeniable. With the pulsating sway of its liquid mosaic narrative, the novel may recall Virginia Woolf's The Waves, but is entirely its own animal: kaleidoscopic, pointedly disorienting in its looseness, and powered along by snatches of speech from its compelling ensemble cast, often vernacular, often overheard: "The woman is old, I hear children saying nearby, not in the way we consider all adults to be old, but really old, ancient, she is endless." It's a book seemingly drawn from deep wells of Black American reality: her female protagonists push back against authority in the very vivacity of their telling, setting afoot a freeing-up and a mysterious inversion of marginalization. "Looseness, that is the thing people fear in a person (in women) and in objects." A surreal musing, Ruins, Child uses the lens of urban infrastructure, botany, social commentary, folklore, choreography, and collective listening to create an ethnography of place and an ode to communal ruins.

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"A fine, powerful book.” —Marilynne Robinson, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Gilead

From the moment Ava Carson and her ten-year-old son, Toussaint, arrive at the Glenn Avenue family shelter in Philadelphia 1985, Ava is already plotting a way out. She is repulsed by the shelter's squalid conditions: their cockroach-infested room, the barely edible food, and the shifty night security guard. She is determined to rescue her son from the perils and indignities of that place, and to save herself from the complicated past that led them there.

Ava has been estranged from her own mother, Dutchess, since she left her Alabama home as a young woman barely out of her teens. Despite their estrangement and the thousand miles between them, mother and daughter are deeply entwined, but Ava can't forgive her sharp-tounged, larger than life mother whose intractability and bouts of debilitating despair brought young Ava to the outer reaches of neglect and hunger.

Ava wants to love her son differently, better. But when Toussaint’s father, Cass, reappears, she is swept off course by his charisma, and the intoxicating power of his radical vision to destroy systems of racial injustice and bring about a bold new way of communal living. 

Meanwhile, in Alabama, Dutchess struggles to keep Bonaparte, once a beacon of Black freedom and self-determination, in the hands of its last five Black residents—families whose lives have been rooted in this stretch of land for generations—and away from rapidly encroaching white developers. She fights against the erasure of Bonaparte's venerable history and the loss of the land itself, which she has so arduously preserved as Ava's inheritance.

As Ava becomes more enmeshed with Cass, Toussaint senses the danger simmering all around him—his well-intentioned but erratic mother; the intense, volatile figure of his father who drives his fledgling Philadelphia community toward ever increasing violence and instability. He begins to dream of Dutchess and Bonaparte, his home and birthright, if only he can find his way there. 

Brilliant, explosive, vitally important new work from one of America’s most fiercely talented storytellers.

The Emancipation Proclamation is one of the most important documents in American history. As we commemorate its 150th anniversary, what do we really know about those who experienced slavery?

In their pioneering book, Envisioning Emancipation, renowned photographic historian Deborah Willis and historian of slavery Barbara Krauthamer have amassed 150 photographs—some never before published—from the antebellum days of the 1850s through the New Deal era of the 1930s. The authors vividly display the seismic impact of emancipation on African Americans born before and after the Proclamation, providing a perspective on freedom and slavery and a way to understand the photos as documents of engagement, action, struggle, and aspiration.

Envisioning Emancipation illustrates what freedom looked like for black Americans in the Civil War era. From photos of the enslaved on plantations and African American soldiers and camp workers in the Union Army to Juneteenth celebrations, slave reunions, and portraits of black families and workers in the American South, the images in this book challenge perceptions of slavery. They show not only what the subjects emphasized about themselves but also the ways Americans of all colors and genders opposed slavery and marked its end.

Filled with powerful images of lives too often ignored or erased from historical records, Envisioning Emancipation provides a new perspective on American culture.