The story of a runaway mother’s ten days of freedom—and the pain, desire, longing, and wonder we find on the messy road to enlightenment—from Pulitzer Prize winner Quiara Alegría Hudes.

April is a young mother raising her daughter in an intergenerational house of unspoken secrets and loud arguments. Her only refuge is to hide away in a locked bathroom, her ears plugged into an ambient soundscape, and a mantra on her lips: dead inside. That is, until one day, as she finds herself spiraling toward the volcanic rage she calls the white hot, a voice inside her tells her to just . . . walk away. She wanders to a bus station and asks for a ticket to the furthest destination; she tells the clerk to make it one-way. That ticket takes her from her Philly home to the threshold of a wilderness and the beginning of a nameless quest—an accidental journey that shakes her awake, almost kills her, and brings her to the brink of an impossible choice.

The White Hot takes the form of a letter from mother to daughter about a moment of abandonment that would stretch from ten days to ten years—an explanation, but not an apology. Hudes narrates April’s story—spiritual and sexy, fierce and funny—with delicate lyricismand tough love. Just as April finds in her painful and absurd sojourn the key to freeing herself and her family from a cage of generational trauma, so Hudes turns April’s stumbling pursuit of herself into an unforgettable short epic of self-discovery.

“This singular memoir stunned me. With a poet’s precision, Rachel Eliza Griffiths renders two interwoven tragedies few others could have lived through, much less written about with such clear-eyed candor.”—Mary Karr, New York Times bestselling author of The Liars’ Club

On September 24, 2021, Rachel Eliza Griffiths married her husband, the novelist Salman Rushdie. On the same day, hundreds of miles away, Griffiths’ closest friend and chosen sister, the poet Kamilah Aisha Moon, who was expected to speak at the wedding, died suddenly. Eleven months later, as Griffiths attempted to piece together her life as a newlywed with heartbreak in one hand and immense love in the other, a brutal attack nearly killed her husband. As trauma compounded trauma, Griffiths realized that in order to survive her grief, she would need to mourn not only her friend, but the woman she had been on her wedding day, a woman who had also died that day.

In the process of rebuilding a self, Griffiths chronicles her friendship with Moon, the seventeen years since their meeting at Sarah Lawrence College. Together, they embraced their literary foremothers—Lucille Clifton, Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, to name a few—and fought to embrace themselves as poets, artists, and Black women. Alongside this unbreakable bond, Griffiths weaves the story of her relationship with Rushdie, of the challenges they have faced and the unshakeable devotion that endures.

In The Flower Bearers, Griffiths inscribes the trajectories of two transformational relationships with grace and honesty, chronicling the beauty and pain that comes with opening oneself fully to love.

A young man journeys from Paris to Rwanda to discover the truth about his family's past in this bestselling, prize-winning novel from internationally renowned Rwandan-French novelist and hip-hop artist Gaël Faye.

"Gaël Faye's talent is breathtaking."--Imbolo Mbue, author of Behold the Dreamers

Milan--the twelve-year-old son of a French father and a Rwandan mother--blames flunking his exams on the emotional toll of the genocide in his mother's homeland. In truth, his mother never talks about Rwanda; the violence is an abstraction that only reaches their French suburb through television broadcasts. That is, until Milan meets Claude, a small boy with a bandaged head whom Milan's mother introduces as a cousin who has come to France seeking medical treatment. Milan embraces him as the brother he's always wanted--until, one day, Claude is sent back to Rwanda without warning, leaving him heartbroken and confused.

Four years later, the boys reunite as teenagers when Milan visits Rwanda for the first time with his mother in the wake of her divorce and discovers a more fractured and vibrant community than he could have imagined. But the trip raises more questions for him than it answers--about family, the war, and its aftershocks. Over the course of many years, Milan will return to Rwanda again and again, compelled to unearth the secrets that have taken root in the shadows of long silences, confront the past, and imagine a new future.

Partly inspired by acclaimed author Gaël Faye's own relationship with Rwanda and its history, Jacaranda is a rich and deeply felt portrait of a man seeking to understand his family and his nation as it heals from the unthinkable.

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A beautiful story inspired by Mae Jemison, the first African American Woman to travel in space.

When Little Mae was a child, she dreamed of dancing in space. She imagined herself surrounded by billions of stars, floating, gliding, and discovering.

Little Mae is a girl with big dreams, a supportive loving family, unbounded passion, and all the right stuff to dance among the stars. Against all odds, she will overcome any obstacle to become an astronaut one day.

A call to courage and connection from prize-winning poet and champion for the arts and humanities Elizabeth Alexander.

“We send signals across vast distances, hoping to connect.” In luminous prose, Elizabeth Alexander embraces that hope, offering resources―life wisdom, historical perspective, poetry, and art―to embolden us to “reach beyond ourselves.” Her close readings of visionary poets, interwoven with extraordinary visual art, reveal how poetry and art can sustain us. Her stories of connection―as a daughter, wife, widow, and mother; as an aspiring dancer; on the dais at President Obama’s inauguration; in the hospital with her college-age son―deeply move us. She shines a light on our nation’s painful history of inequity, recounting in her Class Day speech to Yale students the thwarted dream destroyed in 1831 of a Black college in New Haven; she calls for a reckoning of centuries of injustice in historical memory and memorializing. She asks, What will we each do to make the dream of freedom, for everyone, real? Every page conveys her hope that we recognize the abundant resources we carry within: language, history, community, family, our bodies, our stories, love itself. Signals Across Vast Distances empowers us―in Alexander’s closing words―to lead with love.

12 color illustrations

Barbara Jordan was the first African American to serve in the Texas Senate since Reconstruction, the first black woman elected to Congress from the South, and the first to deliver the keynote address at a national party convention. Yet Jordan herself remained a mystery, a woman so private that even her close friends did not know the name of the illness that debilitated her for two decades until it struck her down at the age of fifty-nine.

In Barbara Jordan, Mary Beth Rogers deftly explores the forces that shaped the moral character and quiet dignity of this extraordinary woman.  She reveals the seeds of Jordan's trademark stoicism while recapturing the essence of a black woman entering politics just as the civil rights movement exploded across the nation. Celebrating Jordan's elegance, passion, and patriotism, this illuminating portrayal gives new depth to our understanding of one of the most influential women of our time-a woman whose powerful convictions and flair for oratorical drama changed the political landscape of America's twentieth century.

With sixteen weeks to go to his life-altering brain surgery, teenaged film buff Wali Khan decides it's time to turn the lens on community, family and friends in this tender yet humorous coming-of-age novel for ages 12 and up.

For fans of John Green, Adam Silvera, Ned Vizzini and Adib Khorram.

Fifteen-year-old Wali Khan, affectionately called "Vali the Vomiter" by his older twin sisters, has always chalked up his throwing up to a delicate stomach. And the headaches in ninth grade? Worrying about grades. But waking up in the hospital in the second week of tenth grade, he is shocked to hear the cause: acoustic neuroma, a golf-ball-sized tumor pressing on his ear canal.

The good news: it's most likely benign. The bad news: surgery in four months, with probable hearing loss as a result.

Starting a new year in high school with a looming life-altering surgery date forces Wali, a passionate film buff, to look inward, at his family, friends and even himself. Why is this happening to him?

His Muslim father and Christian mother are supportive, yet sometimes a bit clueless when it comes to their children. His twin sisters are a mix of loving and teasing, and he bounces between spying on them and keeping their secrets. As for the new girl, Ruby Lai-Mirza, he's just not sure he has time for a new friend.

Wali may fear the end, but he’s still got a lot of living to do. It's not over yet.

In the first book of a visionary fantasy trilogy with its roots in the mythology of Africa and Arabia that “sings of rebellion, love, and the courage it takes to stand up to tyranny” (Samantha Shannon, author of The Priory of the Orange Tree), three women band together against a cruel empire that divides people by blood.

“A game-changing new voice in epic fantasy . . . There are no Chosen Ones here, only bad choices and blood.”—Tasha Suri, author of The Jasmine Throne

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Oprah Daily, Autostraddle

Red is the blood of the elite, of magic, of control.
Blue is the blood of the poor, of workers, of the resistance.
Clear is the blood of the slaves, of the crushed, of the invisible.

Sylah dreams of days growing up in the resistance, being told she would spark a revolution that would free the empire from the red-blooded ruling classes’ tyranny. That spark was extinguished the day she watched her family murdered before her eyes.

Anoor has been told she’s nothing, no one, a disappointment, by the only person who matters: her mother, the most powerful ruler in the empire. But when Sylah and Anoor meet, a fire burns between them that could consume the kingdom—and their hearts. 

Hassa moves through the world unseen by upper classes, so she knows what it means to be invisible. But invisibility has its uses: It can hide the most dangerous of secrets, secrets that can reignite a revolution. And when she joins forces with Sylah and Anoor, together these grains of sand will become a storm. 

As the empire begins a set of trials of combat and skill designed to find its new leaders, the stage is set for blood to flow, power to shift, and cities to burn. 
 
Book One of The Ending Fire Trilogy

Don’t miss any of Saara El-Arifi’s searing Ending Fire Trilogy:
THE FINAL STRIFE • THE BATTLE DRUM • THE ENDING FIRE

"A lion in literature’s forest"—Maya Angelou
A dazzling selection of poems from one of the most beloved American poets, whose distinctive verse resonates around the globe

Few poets in history have possessed the irrepressible humanity and abundant positivity that characterize Sonia Sanchez’s astonishing body of work.

Energetic, infectious and rich with sonic exuberance, Sanchez’s poems have radically transformed the direction of American poetry over the past six decades and have been an inspiration to readers around the world, including Toni Morrison and Chinua Achebe. Whether it’s her iconic haiku, rhythmic ballads or devastating elegies, Sanchez’s luminous verse thrums with a profound generosity and an international consciousness, rendering all of life’s agony and ecstasy.

This volume draws on Sanchez’s diverse repertoire to showcase the multiplicities of the poet’s voice—the profound and personal, the firebrand and socially conscious, the playful and formally dexterous, and the musical—to celebrate her as one of the world’s most skilled and versatile poets of the past half century.

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On January 20, 2021, Amanda Gorman became the sixth and youngest poet to deliver a poetry reading at a presidential inauguration. Taking the stage after the 46th president of the United States, Joe Biden, Gorman captivated the nation and brought hope to viewers around the globe. Her poem “The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country” can now be cherished in this special gift edition. Including an enduring foreword by Oprah Winfrey, this keepsake celebrates the promise of America and affirms the power of poetry.

An unforgettable, heartwarming, hilarious coming-of-age story about faith, family, all kinds of love, and a Black Muslim teen pursuing an ordinary goal in an extraordinary time.

Barely one week into senior year of high school, Boston native Zakiyyah is making her 2012-2013 Get Free Plan.

Step one: quit high school. (PSA: There are other ways to get to college!)

Step two: live like it’s Ramadan year-round.

As she gets deeper into her Plan, she starts to wonder if there’s someone out there who would be a good companion. To everyone’s surprise, Zakiyyah decides she wants to get married. But there are some complications.

Problem one: she’s never met a guy she liked. Zakiyyah’s family (reluctantly) and friends (eagerly) agree to support the search.

Problem two: what’s the secret to choosing a good life partner?

Enter Musa, by way of mutual friends. With marriage in mind, Zakiyyah and Musa get to know each other, progressing from email to instant messaging to phone calls. Things are going well… thrillingly well… until tragedy strikes Boston. In a moment of heightened emotion and stress, Zakiyyah and Musa have their first major disagreement.

Zakiyyah can call the whole thing off. But with or without Musa, what does it mean to live on her own terms?

New York Times Bestseller

From the author of the classic Their Eyes Were Watching God comes a landmark publication of the American experience, now in paperback!

“A profound impact on Hurston’s literary legacy.”— New York Times

In 1927, Zora Neale Hurston traveled to Plateau, Alabama, to visit eighty-six-year-old Cudjo Lewis, a survivor of the Clotilda, the last slaver known to have made the transatlantic journey. Illegally brought to the United States, Lewis was enslaved fifty years after the transoceanic slave trade was outlawed. At the time, Cudjo Lewis was the only known person alive who could recount this integral part of the nation’s history. As a cultural anthropologist and ethnographer, Hurston was eager to hear about these experiences firsthand. But the reticent elder didn’t always speak when she came to visit. Sometimes he would tend his garden, repair his fence, or be lost in reveries of his homeland.

Hurston persisted, though, and during an intense period of about three months, she and Cudjo Lewis communed over her gifts of peaches and watermelon, and gradually Lewis, a poetic storyteller, began to share heartrending memories of his childhood in Africa; the attack by, Amazons, the female warriors who slaughtered his townspeople; the horrors of being captured and held in the barracoons of Ouidah for selection by American traders; the harrowing ordeal of the Middle Passage aboard the Clotilda, as “cargo,” along with more than one hundred other souls; the years he spent in slavery until the end of the Civil War; and finally his role in the founding of Africatown.

Barracoon reflects Hurston’s skills as both a social scientist and a writer, and brings to life Cudjo Lewis’s singular voice, in his vernacular, in a poignant, powerful tribute to the disremembered and the unaccounted for others of the Middle Passage. This profound work is an invaluable contribution to our history and culture.