In the tradition of Claudia Tate’s classic book, reenvisioned for the twenty-first century, Khadijah Queen showcases fifteen leading Black women writers who are influencing our cultural and literary future.

Like the luminaries Tate interviewed forty years ago, the writers in this collection demonstrate how their identities are integral to their creative processes in craft, thought, and imagination. Queen highlights the impacts and influence of social media, artificial intelligence, disability, the business of writing, and other subjects crucial to the imaginative and intellectual production of Black women writers at work today.

These poets, scientists, comic book artists, nonfiction writers, novelists, researchers, and playwrights provide a window into the connections between their lives and their art, offering an account of why and for whom they write.

Featuring conversations with: Elizabeth Alexander, Mahogany L. Browne, Rita Dove, Camille T. Dungy, Eve L. Ewing, Vievee Francis, Kaitlyn Greenidge, alexis pauline gumbs, Jzl Jmz, Morgan Parker, Imani Perry, Deesha Philyaw, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, Treasure Shields Redmond, and Jesmyn Ward.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Provocative and illuminating essays from women at the forefront of the climate movement who are harnessing truth, courage, and solutions to lead humanity forward.

“A powerful read that fills one with, dare I say . . . hope?”—The New York Times
 
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE

There is a renaissance blooming in the climate movement: leadership that is more characteristically feminine and more faithfully feminist, rooted in compassion, connection, creativity, and collaboration. While it’s clear that women and girls are vital voices and agents of change for this planet, they are too often missing from the proverbial table. More than a problem of bias, it’s a dynamic that sets us up for failure. To change everything, we need everyone.
 
All We Can Save illuminates the expertise and insights of dozens of diverse women leading on climate in the United States—scientists, journalists, farmers, lawyers, teachers, activists, innovators, wonks, and designers, across generations, geographies, and race—and aims to advance a more representative, nuanced, and solution-oriented public conversation on the climate crisis. These women offer a spectrum of ideas and insights for how we can rapidly, radically reshape society.
 
Intermixing essays with poetry and art, this book is both a balm and a guide for knowing and holding what has been done to the world, while bolstering our resolve never to give up on one another or our collective future. We must summon truth, courage, and solutions to turn away from the brink and toward life-giving possibility. Curated by two climate leaders, this collection is a celebration of visionaries who are leading us on a path toward all we can save.

With essays and poems by:

Emily Atkin • Xiye Bastida • Ellen Bass • Colette Pichon Battle • Jainey K. Bavishi • Janine Benyus • adrienne maree brown • Régine Clément • Abigail Dillen • Camille T. Dungy • Rhiana Gunn-Wright • Joy Harjo • Katharine Hayhoe • Mary Annaïse Heglar • Jane Hirshfield • Mary Anne Hitt • Ailish Hopper • Tara Houska, Zhaabowekwe • Emily N. Johnston • Joan Naviyuk Kane • Naomi Klein • Kate Knuth • Ada Limón • Louise Maher-Johnson • Kate Marvel • Gina McCarthy • Anne Haven McDonnell • Sarah Miller • Sherri Mitchell, Weh’na Ha’mu Kwasset • Susanne C. Moser • Lynna Odel • Sharon Olds • Mary Oliver • Kate Orff • Jacqui Patterson • Leah Penniman • Catherine Pierce • Marge Piercy • Kendra Pierre-Louis • Varshini • Prakash • Janisse Ray • Christine E. Nieves Rodriguez • Favianna Rodriguez • Cameron Russell • Ash Sanders • Judith D. Schwartz • Patricia Smith • Emily Stengel • Sarah Stillman • Leah Cardamore Stokes • Amanda Sturgeon • Maggie Thomas • Heather McTeer Toney • Alexandria Villaseñor • Alice Walker • Amy Westervelt • Jane Zelikova

*Ships in 7-10 business days*

More than 30 acclaimed writers—including diverse voices such as Nikki Giovanni, David Omotosho Black, Natasha Trethewey, Barry Jenkins, Jacqueline Woodson, Tayari Jones, and Angela Flournoy—reflect on their experience and expertise in this unique book on the craft of writing that focuses on the Black creative spirit.

How We Do It is an anthology curated by Black writers for the creation and proliferation of Black thought. While a creator’s ethnicity does not solely define them, it is inherently part of who they are and how they interpret the world.

For centuries, Black creators have utilized oral and written storytelling traditions in crafting their art. But how does one begin the process of constructing a poem or story or character? How do Black writers, when faced with questions of “authenticity,” dive deep into the essence of their lives and work to find the inherent truth? How We Do It addresses these profound questions. Not a traditional “how to” writing handbook, it seeks to guide rather than dictate and to validate the complexity and range of styles—and even how one thinks about craft itself.

An outstanding list of contributors offer their insights on a range of important topics. Pulitzer Prize winner Jericho Brown explores the lives personified in poetry, while Pulitzer Prize winner Natasha Trethewey explores decolonizing enduring metaphors. National Book Award finalist Angela Flournoy illuminates the pain of grief in all forms and how it can be revealed in the act of creation, and iconoclast Nikki Giovanni offers an elegiac declaration on language.

New and previously published essays and interviews provide encouragement, examples, and templates, and offer lessons on everything from poetic form and plotting a story to the lessons inherent in the act of writing, trial & error, and finding inspiration in the works of others, including those of Toni Morrison, Shakespeare, and Edward P. Jones. A handbook and a reference tool, How We Do It is a thoughtful and welcome tool that offers direction to help Black artists establish their own creative practice while celebrating and widening the scope of the Black writer’s role in art, history, and culture.

Contributors include David Omotosho Black, Jericho Brown, Breena Clark, Rita Dove, Camille T. Dungy, W. Ralph Eubanks, Curdella Forbes, Angela Flournoy, Ernest Gaines, Nikki Giovanni, Marita Golden, Ravi Howard, Terrance Hayes, Mitchell S. Jackson, Barry Jenkins, Charles S. Johnson, Tayari Jones, Jamaica Kincaid, Tony Medina, E. Ethelbert Miller, Elizabeth Nunez, Carl Phillips, Jewell Parker Rhodes, Rion Amilcar Scott, Evie Shockley, Natasha Trethewey, Frank X Walker, Afaa M. Weaver, Crystal Wilkinson, Jacqueline Woodson, Tiphanie Yanique.

A landmark survey of African American literature about Black experiences of the maritime environment.

The ocean is foundational to the story of Africans in America, beginning with the searing Middle Passage. Initially evoking terror, pain, and death, the ocean also became associated with escape, empowerment, freedom, and home, as over time, African Americans in seaport towns found work, built communities, and gained knowledge from travelers. David R. Anderson shows in this groundbreaking collection of memoir, fiction, poetry, and more that African American maritime literature summons many of the traditional themes―survival in the face of overwhelming natural force, sublimity, demonstration of skill and merit, and self-discovery―but often with an eye on legacies of imperialism, slavery, discrimination, and cultural erasure.

Divided thematically across ten sections that address peril, labor, recreation, and more, the book gathers work by influential writers and intellectuals from the eighteenth century to the present, including: Lucille Clifton, Edwidge Danticat, Frederick Douglass, Alice Dunbar-Nelson, W. E. B. DuBois, Camille T. Dungy, Marcus Garvey, Robert Hayden, Zora Neale Hurston, Major Jackson, Harriet Jacobs, John S. Jacobs, Nella Larsen, Claude McKay, Toni Morrison, Walter Mosley, Natasha Trethewey, Phillis Wheatley, Colson Whitehead, and Kevin Young.

Light in spirit and easy to make, FREE SPIRIT COCKTAILS is a refreshing approach to cocktail-making without the hangover.

Lighthearted and full of easy-to-make drinks, FREE SPIRIT COCKTAILS is a refreshing approach to cocktail-making without the hangover. This collection of 40 zero-alcohol recipes features a wide variety of flavorful refreshments that have the look and feel of well-crafted cocktails without any liquor involved. From twists on classic cocktails to inventive sippers, quick 3-ingredient recipes, and more, this mocktail book offers countless opportunities for a spirit-free moment:

• Unwind after a long day with a fragrant glass of A Perfect Pear.
• Mix up some flavorful Faux Swizzles for a zero-proof mocktail party.
• Host a perfect brunch with a large batch of Life's a Peach.
• Cheers with a glass of Be My Honey to celebrate all of life's moments.

• People looking for fun alcohol-free recipes

In Washington, D.C.’s powerful Black elite, legacy is everything. When a young heir to one of the city’s most influential institutions seeks funding to cement her future, a shadowy organization offers to help—but it could cost her far more than she’s willing to give.

“A biting satire about the ever-shifting ways to perform Blackness. This is a very special book.”—Bridgett M. Davis, author of The World According to Fannie Davis

Nina Johnson has always taken pride in belonging to The Tenth. After all, she’s following in the footsteps of her ancestors: Her great-great-grandmother founded the prestigious DC society—a space for influential African Americans—just forty years after the Emancipation Proclamation. Nina’s been elected to helm the organization, but she’s determined to escape the influence of her mother, who has led the organization with a steadfast commitment to tradition, all while keeping Nina under her freshly manicured thumb. Nina’s determined to forge her own path and do things differently: fewer stuffy, out-of-touch meetings and boring galas, more young people, and a swankier headquarters.

To realize her ambitions, Nina needs funding. So, when a wealthy white benefactor named Sienna Masters offers financial support in exchange for her participation in a mysterious project at a former public housing complex, The Orchard, Nina ignores her initial skepticism and agrees to a partnership. But as Nina and those closest to her piece together Sienna's true motives, they discover far more sinister forces at play, ones that exploit Nina's community for profit, with stakes that extend far beyond her ambitions for The Tenth. But how far is Nina willing to go to shape her future? And what is she willing to sacrifice along the way?

A whip-smart and sly social commentary on the complex interplay of race, class, and family legacy, A Very Special Episode will keep you on the edge of your seat.

From the final decades of US slavery to the present, a powerful and illuminating history of a profound inequity: the special burden of infant care and loss experienced by Black women.

In the United States, Black infants are far less likely than white infants to survive their first year of life. Underlying this predicament is a history of profound loss and persistent striving, which has durably shaped Black life in America. Following generations of mothers, caregivers, laborers, and activists from the final decades of slavery to the present, Perilous Passages chronicles the intimate practices and collective strategies Black communities created and relied upon to sustain early life threatened by disease, inadequate medical care, and racialized harm.

Perilous Passages examines nineteenth-century domestic care practices that carried families through the violence of slavery and war, and traces Black eugenic ideas, the efforts of various grassroots movements, and myths and realities surrounding the 1980s panic over “crack babies.” Health professionals, legal officials, and scientific experts exerted pressure, sometimes directly―as in antimidwifery campaigns―and sometimes more subtly, through life insurance practices that devalued Black life. Wangui Muigai shows that at every turn, authorities recast infant deaths as the fault of Black women, with ongoing impact on birthing experiences and outcomes. Still, Black women and their communities have always done more than bear loss. They have produced vital knowledge about its causes, trained in specialized care, developed networks of cradle-to-grave support, and organized to reform society in ways that safeguard children.

Centering Black women’s experiences, Perilous Passages insists on visceral confrontation with the deadliness of American racism while also offering a powerful account of what makes life possible.

One word is about to change everything you believe about yourself.

From sought-after coach, speaker, and author Wemi Opakunle, whose content has reached millions, a transformative guide to harnessing the power of “delulu” thinking—radical self-belief paired with bold, inspired action—to create the life, career, and opportunities you want.

For years, we've been told to be realistic, lower our expectations, and wait until we're fully qualified, fully prepared, or fully confident before going after what we want. But what if everything we've been taught is backwards? What if delulu belief is the bridge between who you are and who you want to be?

In BIG. DELULU. ENERGY., Wemi Opakunle introduces an unapologetic, powerful new approach to personal growth built on self-belief, intentional action, and the courage to think bigger than your current circumstances. Far from denying reality, “delulu” thinking is about refusing to let your fears, limitations, or past experiences define what’s possible for your future.

Through her transformative Eight Pillars of Delulu Success, Wemi shows you how to:
* Build unshakable confidence and trust yourself more deeply
* Stop waiting for certainty and move before you're ready
* Transform fear, setbacks, and self-doubt into fuel for growth
* Embody the mindset and emotions of the person you want to become
* Release perfectionism and detach from outcomes you can’t control
* Silence your inner critic and separate your identity from your inner dialogue to create lasting self-worth
* Reinvent yourself at any stage of life and create a future that feels aligned, joyful, and expansive
* Challenge the labels that have been placed on you, including the ones you've placed on yourself

Warm, practical, and passionately encouraging, BIG. DELULU. ENERGY. offers a refreshing alternative to self-help rooted in hustle and perfectionism. This is a guide to betting on yourself, embracing possibility, and becoming the person you’ve always imagined you could be.

DELUXE LIMITED EDITION first printing featuring stenciled edges

The LONG AWAITED adult debut novel by beloved NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING Dhonielle Clayton: a romantic contemporary fantasy novel set in New Orleans, about a woman pulled back into a forbidden love, kicking off a brand new series

Collette Marchand never wanted to return home to the immortal wards of New Orleans, let alone inherit her mother’s blood-soaked business. Collette left magic and a great love behind a decade ago, tucking herself away in Boston. But now, her mother, Lady Red, the living Conjure Saint and matriarch of the most notorious Conjure House, has died for the final time.

Back in New Orleans, Téo Baptiste is stuck. He’s working at the same hospital where, ten years ago, he lost everything – his sobriety and the love of his life, Collette. Nights at the busiest ER in the city help him bury his feelings and ignore his magical destiny to take over the undead immortal ward. But Lady Red’s death might be his chance to make things right with Collette again, and build a new future for himself.

When Collette is summoned back home to bury her mother, she uncovers Lady Red’s greatest secret: the true source of her power is a stolen card from the Deck of Life. A card that, along with the family business, passes to Collette. Determined to rewrite the past, Collette needs help from the last person she wants to see ever again: her former flame and the man who shattered her heart, Téo. Now, Collette must confront whether she’s destined to become the next Lady Red and rule over the immortal wards of New Orleans and beyond … or take a second chance at love.

An eloquent and original exploration of the Atlantic slave trade―now featuring the essay “Venus in Two Acts” and a new introduction by Dionne Brand.

A monumental work of first-person history, Lose Your Mother traces the legacy of the Atlantic slave trade by recounting a journey Saidiya Hartman took along a slave route in Ghana. Following the trail of captives from the hinterland to the Atlantic coast, she reckons with the blank slate of her own genealogy and the rippling effects of slavery on three centuries of African and African-American history.

The slave, Hartman observes, is a stranger―torn from family, home, and country. To lose your mother is to be severed from your kin, to be uprooted from your past, and to inhabit the world as an outsider. There are no known survivors of Hartman’s lineage, no relatives in Ghana whom she came hoping to find. Instead, she is a stranger in search of strangers, forging connections with others living in the wake of atrocity.

A rigorous and intimate reflection on the afterlife of slavery, Lose Your Mother is both a book of history and a book of grief. This 20th anniversary edition now includes Hartman’s landmark essay “Venus in Two Acts” and a new introduction by Dionne Brand―perfect for introducing new readers to Hartman’s lived-in way of contending with the past.

The next book in the New Haven series, interconnected standalones featuring second chances, fiery passion, and Black heroines who get their happily ever afters.

Rae

Loving someone with demons is hard but leaving them is harder.

That's a lesson I learned roughly a decade ago when I left the love of my life behind. Choosing the child we made but weren't ready for over any hope for what could be. Trading in potential for reality, my dreams for motherhood and the warmth of his embrace for a cold, lonely world.

Despite how tragic it all sounds, everything turned out okay. I made peace with my decisions, soothed the ache in my heart with harsh truths that have remained firmly in tact until...well, until now.

Now, I'm back in New Haven and nothing is the way it should be. The man I left behind is not the one I keep running into around town. He's steady, dependable, stable, ready to be a father to our daughter and desperate to do more than co-parent with me.

Hunter

couldn't stop wanting Rachel Prince if I tried. Not that I ever have. Tried, that is. Why would I when she's the only good thing I've ever craved, the only addiction I've had that didn't try to destroy me?

When she left me, I wasn't mad. I didn't want her to go, but I think by the end we both knew she couldn't stay. There was too much darkness around us, and it was all emanating from me.

My addiction. My pain. My grief overshadowing hers.

I wasn't the man she needed or the partner she deserved. She did the right thing, getting out, taking our kid with her. But knowing that doesn't make it hurt any less.

It does, however, make me determined.

To keep my decade long sobriety streak going.

To make up for every day I missed of my daughter's life.

To win back the love of my life and never let her go again.