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The popular host of the Money Moves podcast and youngest person ever to trade on the New York Stock Exchange provides winning tips for women to help them shift their financial mindset, become confident about their money, set them on a path to financial security, and live their best lives.

“Seventy three percent of Americans ranked their finances as the number one cause of stress in their lives. But financial wellness can have a positive effect on your entire life. Not only when it comes to money and finances, but the quality and ease of how you live. Financial wellness means freedom for your body and freedom for your mind. Financial stress can also cause the breakdown of relationships. But it doesn’t have to be that way.”—Lauren Simmons

In 2017, when she was only twenty-two, Lauren Simmons became the youngest full-time female trader at the New York Stock Exchange, and the second African American woman in the Exchange's 228-year history to hold such a position. Driven by a passion for empowering women, Millennials, Gen Zs, and minorities to become more financially savvy, she now shares her experience and knowledge in this savvy financial guide.

Simmons brings a fresh perspective to personal finance: she is a young African American woman with an understanding of how to increase wealth and an awareness of generational and cultural barriers—such an income inequity—that can hold people back from taking financial risks. In her warm, down-to-earth voice, Simmons makes confusing topics easy to understand. She breaks down the pros and cons of buying stocks and Treasuries, explains how to maximize your 401K opportunities even in challenging economic times, advises how to grapple with student loans, and helps you break family cycles when dealing (or not) with debt.

Simmons helps a new generation and others who have been overlooked learn how to take care of their money—so their money can take care of them, today and tomorrow.

She needed a second chance. He couldn’t survive another loss. What began as a pretend relationship became impossible to fake in a small town that remembers everything and forgives nothing.

Kerry Kind never expected to start over in her thirties. Reeling from a painful divorce and a very public fallout, she is desperate for a fresh start and a chance to reclaim her life. When she lands a homeschool teaching position in a tight-knit small town, it feels like the second chance she’s been fighting for. That relief quickly fades when she realizes her new boss is the same man she clashed with just days earlier.

Victor Grimes is a world-renowned chef, devoted single father, and widower who has rebuilt his life around structure, control, and emotional distance. Love is no longer part of the plan. But when his daughters need stability and Kerry proves to be exactly what they’ve been missing, Victor finds himself confronting feelings he’s spent years trying to suppress.

What begins as a reluctant partnership and a harmless fake dating arrangement meant to quiet gossip, soon blurs the line between professional and personal. Their chemistry is undeniable, and their connection deepens with every moment spent together.
As old wounds resurface and their worlds collide, Kerry and Victor must decide whether love is worth risking everything they have worked so hard to protect, or if some lessons are too painful to relearn.

In Gauthier, love isn’t just found. It’s forever.

Phylicia “Phil” Simmons has built her life around restoring the past. Her craftsmanship and eye for beauty have made her one of Louisiana’s most sought-after artisans, but taking on the renovation of Belle Maison, a once grand bed and breakfast in her hometown, means more than reviving an old house. It means facing Jamal Johnson, the ambitious architect whose bold ideas test her patience as much as they stir something she isn’t ready to name.

He believes in innovation. She believes in preservation. But the more they clash over blueprints and late-night plans, the harder it becomes to fight the pull between them.

In the heart of a small Southern town where history lingers and hearts rarely rest, two people on opposite sides of a dream begin to blur the line between rebuilding what was lost and reaching for something that could last always and forever.

An inspiring, indelible memoir from the daughter of sharecroppers in East Texas who became the first Black president of an Ivy League University—an uplifting story of girlhood and the power of family, community, and the classroom to transform one young person's life.

I was born at a crossroads: a crossroads in history, a crossroads in culture, and a geographical crossroads in North Houston County in East Texas.

Born in 1945, Ruth J. Simmons grew up the twelfth child of sharecroppers. Her first home had no running water, no electricity to light the two crowded rooms, no books to read. Yet despite this—or, in her words, because of it—Simmons would become one of America’s preeminent educators. The former president of Smith College and Brown University, and now the outgoing president of Prairie View A&M, Texas's oldest HBCU, for decades Simmons has inspired generations of students as she herself made history.

In Up Home, Simmons takes us back to Grapeland to show how the people who love us when we are young shape who we become: We meet her caring, tireless mother who managed to feed her large family with an often empty pantry; her father, who refused to let racial and economic injustice crush his youngest daughter's dreams; the doting brothers and sisters; and the attentive teachers who welcomed Ruth into the classroom, guiding her to a future she could hardly imagine as a child.

From the farmland of East Texas to Houston's Fifth Ward to New Orleans at the dawn of the civil rights movement, Simmons depicts an era long gone but whose legacies of inequality we still live with today. Written in clear and timeless prose, Up Home is both an origin story set in the segregated South and the uplifting chronicle of a girl whose intellect, grace, and curiosity guide her as she creates a place for herself in the world.

We all feel it, the teetering toward a place in America from which there is no return. The battle to remain hopeful in spite of injustice after injustice. In this powerful story of one lawyer’s fight for his community, both justice and hope are redeemed.

The Greenwood neighborhood of North Tulsa was once a promised land for African Americans, deemed “Black Wall Street.” But on May 31, 1921, the deadliest race massacre in U.S. history sent Greenwood up in flames. At the time, Lessie Randle was just a child running to safety as bullets ricocheted around her. Almost a century later, lawyer Damario Solomon-Simmons knocks on her door asking if she’d be willing to run toward justice this time.

In Redeem a Nation, we follow Solomon-Simmons’s fight for justice, from the courtrooms of Tulsa to our nation’s capital, representing three centenarians: the last survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre. Documenting a race against the calendar and the courts, Redeem a Nation grapples with the truth about corruption and disenfranchisement in America through this historic legal case for reparations and the deeply moving stories of survivors and descendants of the Massacre.

Yet this isn’t just a story of Tulsa. The community is a microcosm of the continued harm America inflicts through racial violence and economic injustice. The damage of generational poverty and loss of opportunity isn’t some relic of the past. It is happening right now. Redeem a Nation offers a way forward for communities across the nation through systemic change and community love. The Time is now to resist, repair, and redeem a land once promised.

“You think we can win?” Randle asked that day. This story is Solomon-Simmons’s answer.

Fiery, funny, inviting and digressive, Sonny Simmons' memoir is a long overdue celebration of the famed New York free jazz pioneer

Though his years in the New York free-jazz scene of the sixties cemented his reputation as "one of the most forceful and convincing composers and soloists in his field," saxophonist Sonny Simmons (1933–2021) was nearly forgotten by the '80s, which found him broke, heavily dependent on drugs and alcohol, and separated from his wife and kids. "I played on the streets from 1980 to 1994, 365 days a year," Simmons tells jazz historian and biographer Marc Chaloin. "I would go to North Beach, and I'd sleep in the park. The word got around town that Sonny is a junkie, really strung out."
The resurrection of Simmons' career―upon the release of his critically acclaimed Ancient Ritual (Qwest Records) in 1994―has become a modern legend of the genre. In the last two decades of his musical career, Simmons broke through to a new echelon of recognition, joining the pantheon of great innovators and masters of the music. But to this day he remains an undersung figure. Here, in the first ever book dedicated to his life, Simmons recounts his childhood in the backwoods of Louisiana, his adolescence in the burgeoning Bay Area jazz scene and his star-studded life in New York playing alongside the greats.

Gail Simmons will be in conversation with Chris Shepherd on November 17th at the Hobby Center as part of her official book tour.  Get tickets HERE!

From author, culinary expert, and Top Chef judge Gail Simmons comes a fun, informative, and trailblazing guide to a rarely-explored side of hospitality: how to be a great guest.

Countless influential voices have written books about hosting, offering tips for what to cook, how to set the perfect table, mix the best drinks and create the most welcoming vibes. But hospitality, by definition, involves at least two people; where is the advice for guests?

Culinary expert and perennial Top Chef judge Gail Simmons is something of a professional on the subject. As a tastemaker and lifestyle authority, she is invited to countless social events running the gamut from world-class fine dining and international affairs to neighborhood potlucks. Through it all, she knows that for any gathering to be a success, guests must rise to the occasion and actively embrace their role.

In Guesting, Gail unpacks the reciprocal nature of this relationship and explores the sometimes-tricky choreography that governs its dance. She also shares her essential tenets of guesting, and proven strategies for navigating any social situation (yes, even assigned seating). From dinner parties to weddings, religious observances to restaurants, Guesting guides readers through all types of “get-togethers” with confidence and grace. It also connects the vital role guesting plays in our wellbeing and the integrity of our collective culture, at a moment when technology and the temptation for short-term comfort have diminished our inherent need to create―and maintain―human relationships.

And since any good guest knows that bringing something to the table is always the right move, Gail shares ideas and recipes for thoughtful store-bought contributions, homemade food gifts, and favorite dishes to share with a crowd. Whether you’re visiting an old friend, going out for dinner, or attending a milestone celebration, Gail has the answers and inspiration to help you become the consummate guest.

BLACK ROMANCE - SMALL-TOWN ROMANCE - SECOND CHANCE - SPORTS ROMANCE - REVERSE GRUMPY X SUNSHINE - HBCU ROMANCE - CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE

In the small, close-knit town of Greer, Georgia, Tiffany Weathers and Mason Boom are two souls bound by a destiny neither of them can explain. From the first shared glance, Mason feels an unshakable connection to Tiffany, a recognition so profound it feels like he’s finally found the missing piece of himself. Tiffany, equally captivated, finds herself drawn to the life that Mason seems to offer—a life filled with love, family, and security. But as they navigate the peaks and valleys of adolescence into adulthood, they face unforeseen trials that test the depths of their love and resilience.

As they mature, Mason’s journey to become an NFL star pulls him into a world of fame and glamour. Tiffany, meanwhile, builds a life for herself as a successful dancer and studio owner, establishing stability for her son, Drew, and creating the quiet, fulfilling life she’s always wanted. Yet, despite their separate paths, fate continues to pull them together, forging a connection that remains unbroken even by time and distance.

Mason returns to Greer with a renewed determination to finally claim the life he’s always envisioned—with Tiffany at its center. For both, it’s a return not just to each other but to the dreams they’ve held onto through years of separation and growth. Reunited, Tiffany and Mason decide they’re done with the years of waiting and misunderstanding. Instead, they commit to building a life together, ready to face whatever challenges come their way. This time, they refuse to let anything or anyone tear them apart.

In The World Around Us, Mason and Tiffany’s love story unfolds as a testament to destiny’s intricate design, where fate, secrets, and shared history bind them in ways even they cannot fully comprehend. Their journey is an exploration of resilience, hope, and the unshakable belief that fate never fails and love will always prevail.

This second-chance sports romance will keep you on the edge of your seat, on the brink of tears, overcome with laughter, and rooting for a love that refuses to fade.