Black History Month 2024: Telling Black StoriesLike this list

24 items

• How Long 'til Black Future Month?

  Jemisin, N. K.,

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  "This first short story collection from the most celebrated speculative fiction author of our time features her signature blend of sharply observed, provocative tales of magic steeped in realism and social commentary." - LibraryReads

• The Fire Next Time

  Baldwin, James, 1924-1987

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  "With clarity, conviction, and passion, James Baldwin delivers a dire warning of the effects of racism that remains urgent nearly sixty years after its original publication. " - Penguin Random House

• Hell of a Book

  or the Altogether Factual, Wholly Bona Fide Story of a Big Dreams, Hard Luck, American-Made Mad Kid

  Mott, Jason,

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  "A Black writer's cross-country book tour becomes a profound exploration of love, friendship, and racial violence in America. As the author confronts the politics of publishing and marketing, he begins to form an unlikely friendship with a Black…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Native Guard

  Trethewey, Natasha D., 1966-

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  "Through elegaic verse that honors her mother and tells of her own fraught childhood, Natasha Trethewey confronts the racial legacy of her native Deep South—--where one of the first black regiments, The Louisiana Native Guards, was called into…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Erasure

  Everett, Percival

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  "A dark satire on race relations and publishing. Thelonius "Monk" Ellison is a gifted writer of experimental fiction whose commercial success is hampered by his not being "black" enough for the (mostly white) literary world. Everett makes good use…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Gathering Blossoms Under Fire

  the Journals of Alice Walker, 1965-2000

  Walker, Alice, 1944-

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  "Over three decades of journal entries from Pulitzer Prize-winner Alice Walker come together in this impressive compendium. Walker meticulously documents her own questions and doubts about writing, as well: “Why is it we always feel embarrassed by…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Bitter Root

  Walker, David, 1968-

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  "Following a mysterious tragedy that sees many of their kin lost or killed, the surviving members of the Sangerye clan suffer an ideological split as to how to proceed, with some cousins remaining in Harlem, continuing to brew herbal remedies in the…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Things Fall Apart

  Achebe, Chinua

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  "Written with quiet dignity that builds to a climax of tragic force, this book about the dissolution of an African tribe, its traditions, and values, represents a welcome departure from the familiar "Me, white brother" genre. Written by a Nigerian…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Caste

  the Origins of Our Discontents

  Wilkerson, Isabel,

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  "In this powerful and extraordinarily timely social history, Pulitzer winner Wilkerson (The Warmth of Other Suns) investigates the origins, evolution, and inner workings of America’s “shape-shifting, unspoken” caste system. Tracking the inception of…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Chameleon Couch

  Poems

  Komunyakaa, Yusef

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  "In a warm, vernacular voice that often soars to dizzying intellectual and poetic strata, Komunyakaa shares powerful experiences that take us to the bar, street, bedroom, kitchen, and across the planet—his image-rich, verbal music moving in and out…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Slumberland

  Beatty, Paul

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  "DJ Darky, a Los Angeles musician who creates beats from found sounds, travels to Berlin, Germany, in search of his avant-garde idol, Charles Stone, aka the Schwa . Shortly after discovering the Schwa's beat in a mysterious envelope, DJ Darky sends…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Sula

  Morrison, Toni

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  "At the heart of Sula is a bond between two women, a friendship whose intensity first sustains, then injures. Sula and Nel are both black, both smart, and both poor. Through their girlhood years, they share everything. All this changes when Sula…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Souls of Black Folk

  Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt), 1868-1963

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  "Personal recollections are included in this work depicting the spirit, status, and problems of African Americans since emancipation and reflecting on the history of race and democracy in America." - NoveList

• Salvage the Bones

  Ward, Jesmyn

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  "An evocative novel of a family torn apart by grief, hardship, misunderstanding and, soon, the biggest storm any of them has ever seen. Set over a dozen days while awaiting the arrival of Hurricane Katrina, and then dealing with its consequences."…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Black Panther Party

  a Graphic Novel History

  Walker, David, 1968-

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  "This nuanced, accessible history of the Black Panther Party doesn’t shy away from the complexity of the political movement, nor does it fall into the trap of painting the diverse group as uniformly heroes or villains. Artist Kwame Anderson balances…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Zami

  a New Spelling of My Name

  Lorde, Audre

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  "In a title that combines autobiography and fiction, activist, writer, and librarian Lorde describes her life as a daughter of immigrants and as a lesbian in 1950s Harlem. She expresses the loneliness of being an outsider and the discovery of a…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Black Boy

  American Hunger : a Record of Childhood and Youth

  Wright, Richard, 1908-1960

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  "Traces the author's coming of age in the Jim Crow-era South, a period during which he struggled to survive while journeying from innocence to adulthood." - NoveList

• The Polished Hoe

  Clarke, Austin, 1934-2016

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  "When Mary Mathilda of the West Indies' Birnshire Island confesses to killing a powerful sugar plantation owner, whom she has served for more than thirty years and who is the father of her grown son, she sets off a devastating all-night vigil." -…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Black Livin'

  Nyemb, Jacques

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• Frank Holster Mysteries

  Nyemb, Jacques

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