#hardcover #fiction #political #culturalheritage #blacklit #race #history #class #jamaica #caribbean Has a sales sticker on the jacket barcode 

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Florida

A Novel

"Ma Taffy may be blind but she sees everything. So when her great-nephew Kaia comes home from school in tears, what she senses sends a deep fear running through her. While they wait for his mama to come home from work, Ma Taffy recalls the story of the flying preacherman and a great thing that did not happen. A poor suburban sprawl in the Jamaican heartland, Augustown is a place where many things that should happen don't, and plenty of things that shouldn't happen do. For the story of Kaia leads back to another momentous day in Jamaican history, the birth of the Rastafari and the desire for a better life"--

Augustown

60b3c769-92a8-4616-8698-c1465f8aab82

#paperback #blackauthors #blacklit #comingofage #blackfiction

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

New York

Coming of Age...Whatever That Means, is a book of short stories that highlights some of the traumas and dramas that we go through that might make us "grow up". The stories, needing to be read in no particular order, are relatable in a number of ways. As always, take what you need and leave what you don't.

Coming of Age, Whatever That Means

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Virginia

A Black Power Manifesto





INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

A New York Times Editor's Choice ^ A Kirkus Best Nonfiction Book of the Year

From journalist and New York Times bestselling author Charles Blow comes a powerful manifesto and call to action, "a must-read in the effort to dismantle deep-seated poisons of systemic racism and white supremacy" (San Francisco Chronicle).

Race, as we have come to understand it, is a fiction; but, racism, as we have come to live it, is a fact. The point here is not to impose a new racial hierarchy, but to remove an existing one. After centuries of waiting for white majorities to overturn white supremacy, it seems to me that it has fallen to Black people to do it themselves.

Acclaimed columnist and author Charles Blow never wanted to write a "race book." But as violence against Black people--both physical and psychological--seemed only to increase in recent years, culminating in the historic pandemic and protests of the summer of 2020, he felt compelled to write a new story for Black Americans. He envisioned a succinct, counterintuitive, and impassioned corrective to the myths that have for too long governed our thinking about race and geography in America. Drawing on both political observations and personal experience as a Black son of the South, Charles set out to offer a call to action by which Black people can finally achieve equality, on their own terms.

So what will it take to make lasting change when small steps have so frequently failed It's going to take an unprecedented shift in power. The Devil You Know is a groundbreaking manifesto, proposing nothing short of the most audacious power play by Black people in the history of this country. This book is a grand exhortation to generations of a people, offering a road map to true and lasting freedom.

The Devil You Know

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#hardcover #comingofage #fiction #aa #blacklit #blackhistorymonth

Ohio

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!

Jacqueline Woodson's first middle-grade novel since National Book Award winner Brown Girl Dreaming celebrates the healing that can occur when a group of students share their stories.

It all starts when six kids have to meet for a weekly chat--by themselves, with no adults to listen in. There, in the room they soon dub the ARTT Room (short for "A Room to Talk"), they discover it's safe to talk about what's bothering them--everything from Esteban's father's deportation and Haley's father's incarceration to Amari's fears of racial profiling and Ashton's adjustment to his changing family fortunes. When the six are together, they can express the feelings and fears they have to hide from the rest of the world. And together, they can grow braver and more ready for the rest of their lives.

Harbor Me

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Her sophomore album following the hate you give ! #blacklit #ya 

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

Michigan

On the come up

#hardcover #blacklit #fiction #racism #jocelynnicolejohnson

Alabama

Fiction

A young woman descended from Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings driven from her neighborhood by a white militia. A university professor studying racism by conducting a secret social experiment on his own son. A single mother desperate to buy her first home even as the world hurtles toward catastrophe. Each fighting to survive in America. Tough-minded, vulnerable, and brave, Jocelyn Nicole Johnson’s precisely imagined debut explores burdened inheritances and extraordinary pursuits of belonging. Set in the near future, the eponymous novella, “My Monticello,” tells of a diverse group of Charlottesville neighbors fleeing violent white supremacists. Led by Da’Naisha, a young Black descendant of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, they seek refuge in Jefferson’s historic plantation home in a desperate attempt to outlive the long-foretold racial and environmental unravelling within the nation. In “Control Negro,” hailed by Roxane Gay as “one hell of story,” a university professor devotes himself to the study of racism and the development of ACMs (average American Caucasian males) by clinically observing his own son from birth in order to “painstakingly mark the route of this Black child too, one whom I could prove was so strikingly decent and true that America could not find fault in him unless we as a nation had projected it there.” Johnson’s characters all seek out home as a place and an internal state, whether in the form of a Nigerian widower who immigrates to a meager existence in the city of Alexandria, finding himself adrift; a young mixed-race woman who adopts a new tongue and name to escape the landscapes of rural Virginia and her family; or a single mother who seeks salvation through “Buying a House Ahead of the Apocalypse.” United by these characters’ relentless struggles against reality and fate, My Monticello is a formidable book that bears witness to this country’s legacies and announces the arrival of a wildly original new voice in American fiction.

My Monticello

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#hardcover #fiction #blacklit #historicalfiction #shortstories

Kentucky

Fiction. A young woman descended from Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings driven from her neighborhood by a white militia. A university professor studying racism by conducting a secret social experiment on his own son. A single mother desperate to buy her first home even as the world hurtles toward catastrophe. Each fighting to survive in America.  Tough-minded, vulnerable, and brave, Jocelyn Nicole Johnson’s precisely imagined debut explores burdened inheritances and extraordinary pursuits of belonging. Set in the near future, the eponymous novella, “My Monticello,” tells of a diverse group of Charlottesville neighbors fleeing violent white supremacists. Led by Da’Naisha, a young Black descendant of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, they seek refuge in Jefferson’s historic plantation home in a desperate attempt to outlive the long-foretold racial and environmental unravelling within the nation.  In “Control Negro,” hailed by Roxane Gay as “one hell of story,” a university professor devotes himself to the study of racism and the development of ACMs (average American Caucasian males) by clinically observing his own son from birth in order to “painstakingly mark the route of this Black child too, one whom I could prove was so strikingly decent and true that America could not find fault in him unless we as a nation had projected it there.” Johnson’s characters all seek out home as a place and an internal state, whether in the form of a Nigerian widower who immigrates to a meager existence in the city of Alexandria, finding himself adrift; a young mixed-race woman who adopts a new tongue and name to escape the landscapes of rural Virginia and her family; or a single mother who seeks salvation through “Buying a House Ahead of the Apocalypse.”  United by these characters’ relentless struggles against reality and fate, My Monticello is a formidable book that bears witness to this country’s legacies and announces the arrival of a wildly original new voice in American fiction.

#hardcover #buddhism #spirituality #faith #mindfulness #hope #selfhelp #quaker #blackwriter #blacklit 
Lovely Call Number Box edition comes with extras. Brand new. 

Braving Your Way Toward Simplicity, Awakening, and Peace

Find spiritual insight for developing courage and meeting life's broken-open, pulled-apart times for anyone seeking hope.

Daily we are asked to move toward bravery, to stretch in the direction of goodness, kindness, forgiveness, patience, and vulnerability. Yet life's tender fragility, fear, anxiety, and our own practiced self-sabotage can derail us from growing and thriving, leaving us fractured and afraid.

Ordained Buddhist teacher and Quaker Valerie Brown invites us into the heart of compassion, insight, and courage. Filled with Quaker wisdom, mindfulness meditation practices, and portraits of real people living out simple yet life-affirming bravery, Hope Leans Forward is a guidebook for all of us who are on journeys of self-transformation, self-discovery, and spiritual discernment. Centering small, everyday acts of bravery with diverse stories from marginalized communities, Brown's unique perspective as a Black Buddhist Dharma teacher in the Plum Village tradition and her extensive leadership experience shepherd us in navigating life's essential questions to discover true aliveness and meaning. When we focus on cultivating clarity and discernment in our purpose, we begin to understand that we are truly connected to--and that we contribute to--a larger whole.

Written through a period of profound personal loss and in the urgency of the Black Lives Matter movement, Brown's spiritual insight and life- and spirit-tested wisdom offers a new source for anyone seeking hope, and seeking to alleviate suffering within ourselves and our communities.

Hope Leans Forward

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West Virginia

Tar Baby

There’s some minor residue by the bar code. See photos for details. 

Oprah's Book Club 2.0 Pick!

In 1923, seventeen-year-old Hattie Shepherd flees Georgia for Philadelphia, where, though her first two babies die because she can't afford medicine, she keeps nine children alive with old southern remedies and sheer love. Saddled with a husband who brings her nothing but disappointment, she prepares her children for a world she knows will not be kind to them. Their trials are the trials on which the history of America was forged, a tribute to the resilience of the human spirit, and a force stronger than love or trouble: the determination to get by and get through. A searing portrait of an unforgettable family, an emotionally transfixing drama of human striving in the face of insurmountable adversity and a ferocious vision of humanity at its most threadbare and elemental, The Twelve Tribes of Hattie introduces a writer of the very first order.

The Twelve Tribes of Hattie

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#paperback #blacklit #essays #new #nonfiction #africanamerican #newnonfiction        T #blacknerdproblems #humor       T

Essays

The creators of the popular website Black Nerd Problems bring their witty and unflinching insight to this engaging collection of pop culture essays--on everything from Mario Kart to issues of representation--that "will fill you with joy and give you hope for the future of geek culture" (Ernest Cline, #1 New York Times bestselling author).

When William Evans and Omar Holmon founded Black Nerd Problems, they had no idea whether anyone beyond their small circle of friends would be interested in their little corner of the internet. But soon after launching, they were surprised to find out that there was a wide community of people who hungered for fresh perspectives on all things nerdy.

In the years since, Evans and Holmon have built a large, dedicated fanbase eager for their brand of cultural critiques, whether in the form of a laugh-out-loud, raucous Game of Thrones episode recap or an eloquent essay on dealing with grief through stand-up comedy. Now, they are ready to take the next step with this vibrant and hilarious essay collection, which covers everything from X-Men to Breonna Taylor with "alternately hilarious, thought-provoking, and passionate" (School Library Journal) insight and intelligence.

A much needed and fresh pop culture critique from the perspective of people of color, "this hugely entertaining, eminently thoughtful collection is a master class in how powerful--and fun--cultural criticism can be" (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

Black Nerd Problems

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New Jersey

#hardcover #fiction #poc #blacklit #historicalfiction #history #blackhistory 

#hardcover #fiction #literaryfiction #lgbtq #literary #comingofage #canada #toronto #socialjustice #blacklit

District of Columbia

"A brilliant, powerful elegy from a living brother to a lost one, yet pulsing with rhythm, and beating with life." --Marlon James

"Highly recommend Brother by David Chariandy--concise and intense, elegiac short novel of devastation and hope." --Joyce Carol Oates, via Twitter

WINNER--Toronto Book Award
WINNER--Rogers' Writers' Trust Fiction Prize
WINNER--Ethel Wilson Prize for Fiction

Esquire Best Books of the Year
Kirkus Best Books of the Year
Guardian Best Books of the Year
New York Public Library Best Books of the Year

Aspen Words Literary Prize Finalist
PEN Open Book Awards Longlist
Orwell Prize for Political Fiction Longlist
The Believer Book Awards Longlist

"Every sentence feels like a polished stone." --Entertainment Weekly

"Elegiac and incendiary" --Boston Globe

"A dwarf star of mourning and regret" --Wall Street Journal

"Elegant, vital, indubitably dope" --Guardian

"An important, vital and groundbreaking book" --Medium

"An absolutely mammoth literary talent" --KIESE LAYMON

"Riveting, composed, charged with feeling" --MADELEINE THIEN

In luminous, incisive prose, a startling new literary talent explores masculinity, race, and sexuality against a backdrop of simmering violence during the summer of 1991.

One sweltering summer in the Park, a housing complex outside of Toronto, Michael and Francis are coming of age and learning to stomach the careless prejudices and low expectations that confront them as young men of black and brown ancestry. While their Trinidadian single mother works double, sometimes triple shifts so her boys might fulfill the elusive promise of their adopted home, Francis helps the days pass by inventing games and challenges, bringing Michael to his crew's barbershop hangout, and leading escapes into the cool air of the Rouge Valley, a scar of green wilderness where they are free to imagine better lives for themselves.

Propelled by the beats and styles of hip hop, Francis dreams of a future in music. Michael's dreams are of Aisha, the smartest girl in their high school whose own eyes are firmly set on a life elsewhere. But the bright hopes of all three are violently, irrevocably thwarted by a tragic shooting, and the police crackdown and suffocating suspicion that follow.

Honest and insightful in its portrayal of kinship, community, and lives cut short, David Chariandy's Brother is an emotional tour de force that marks the arrival of a stunning new literary voice.

Brother

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#paperback #blackhistory #blacklit #poc #blackwomen #history #historical #race #racism #feminism 

Heavy Paperback (2 to 4 lbs)

The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America

“History at its best--clear, intelligent, moving. Paula Giddings has written a book as priceless as its subject”--Toni Morrison

Acclaimed by writers Toni Morrison and Maya Angelou, Paula Giddings's When and Where I Enter is not only an eloquent testament to the unsung contributions of individual women to our nation, but to the collective activism which elevated the race and women's movements that define our times. From Ida B. Wells to the first black Presidential candidate, Shirley Chisholm; from the anti-lynching movement to the struggle for suffrage and equal protection under the law; Giddings tells the stories of black women who transcended the dual discrimination of race and gender--and whose legacy inspires our own generation. Forty years after the passing of the Voting Rights Act, when phrases like “affirmative action” and “wrongful imprisonment” are rallying cries, Giddings words resonate now more than ever.

When and Where I Enter

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#paperback #fiction #drama #play #educational #africanamericans #bipoc #blacklit

An African-American family is united in love and pride as they struggle to overcome poverty and harsh living conditions, in the award-winning 1959 play about an embattled Chicago family

A Raisin in the Sun

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This book is in excellent condition with clean and crisp pages =).  The dust cover is also in great shape with minor shelf wear. #hardcover #fiction #blacklit #poc 

Creases in the first page #paperback #fiction #suspensethrillers #thriller #blacktopwasteland #blackauthors #blackauthor #blacklit 

Pennsylvania

A New York Times Notable Books of 2020 Like Ocean’s Eleven meets Drive, with a Southern noir twist, S. A. Cosby’s Blacktop Wasteland is a searing, operatic story of a man pushed to his limits by poverty, race, and his own former life of crime. “Sensationally good—new, fresh, real, authentic, twisty, with characters and dilemmas that will break your heart. More than recommended.” —Lee Child A husband, a father, a son, a business owner...And the best getaway driver east of the Mississippi. Beauregard “Bug” Montage is an honest mechanic, a loving husband, and a hard-working dad. Bug knows there’s no future in the man he used to be: known from the hills of North Carolina to the beaches of Florida as the best wheelman on the East Coast. He thought he'd left all that behind him, but as his carefully built new life begins to crumble, he finds himself drawn inexorably back into a world of blood and bullets. When a smooth-talking former associate comes calling with a can't-miss jewelry store heist, Bug feels he has no choice but to get back in the driver's seat. And Bug is at his best where the scent of gasoline mixes with the smell of fear. Haunted by the ghost of who he used to be and the father who disappeared when he needed him most, Bug must find a way to navigate this blacktop wasteland...or die trying.

Blacktop Wasteland

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perfect condition except for a small remainder mark on the bottom. 

The Nickel Boys is Colson Whitehead's follow-up to the Pulitzer Prize- and National Book Award-winning bestseller The Underground Railroad, in which he dramatises another strand of United States history, this time through the story of two boys sentenced to a stretch in a hellish reform school in Jim-Crow-era Florida.

The Nickel Boys

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A Phenomenal Book Club Pick

"A great and engrossing read, Kashana humanizes a way of life that is often made fun of and makes the reader understand why someone would go to such great lengths to prepare for the future, so much so she almost sold me on those Life Preserver soy bars!" --Trevor Noah

A single Black lawyer puts her career and personal moral code at risk when she moves in with her coffee entrepreneur boyfriend and his doomsday-prepping roommates in a novel that's packed with tension, curiosity, humor, and wit from a writer with serious comedy credentials

In the wake of her parents' death, Aretha, a habitually single Black lawyer, has had only one obsession in life--success--until she falls for Aaron, a coffee entrepreneur. Moving into his Brooklyn brownstone to live along with his Hurricane Sandy-traumatized, illegal-gun-stockpiling, optimized-soy-protein-eating, bunker-building roommates, Aretha finds that her dreams of making partner are slipping away, replaced by an underground world, one of selling guns and training for a doomsday that's maybe just around the corner. 

For readers of Victor LaValle's The Changeling, Paul Beatty's The Sellout, and Zakiya Harris's The Other Black Girl, The Survivalists is a darkly humorous novel from a smart and relevant new literary voice that's packed with tension, curiosity and wit, and unafraid to ask the questions most relevant to a new generation of Americans: Does it make sense to climb the corporate ladder? What exactly are the politics of gun ownership? And in a world where it's nearly impossible for young people to earn enough money to afford stable housing, what does it take in order to survive?

The Survivalists

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When you're black and female in America, society's rules were never meant to make you safe or free. In this "flawlessly executed work [that] reinvigorates the short fiction genre," Camille Acker's relatable yet unexpected characters break down the walls of respectability politics, showing that the only way for black women to be free is to be themselves (BUST).

In her debut short story collection, Camille Acker unleashes the irony and tragic comedy of respectability onto a wide-ranging cast of characters, all of whom call Washington, DC, home. A "woke" millennial tries to fight gentrification, only to learn she's part of the problem; a grade school teacher dreams of a better DC, only to take out her frustrations on her students; and a young piano player wins a competition, only to learn the prize is worthless. 

Ultimately, they are confronted with the fact that respectability does not equal freedom. Instead, they must learn to trust their own conflicted judgment and fight to create their own sense of space and self.

"A timely, welcome book."--The Millions

Kei Miller

Augustown

Jaymee Veney

Coming of Age, Whatever That Means

Charles M. Blow

The Devil You Know

Jacqueline Woodson

Harbor Me

Angie Thomas

On the come up

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

My Monticello

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

My Monticello

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

My Monticello

Valerie Brown

Hope Leans Forward

Toni Morrison

Tar Baby

Ayana Mathis

The Twelve Tribes of Hattie

William Evans; Omar Holmon

Black Nerd Problems

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

My Monticello

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

My Monticello

David Chariandy

Brother

Paula J. Giddings

When and Where I Enter

Lorraine Hansberry

A Raisin in the Sun

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

My Monticello

S. A. Cosby

Blacktop Wasteland

Colson Whitehead

The Nickel Boys

S. A. Cosby

Blacktop Wasteland

Kashana Cauley

The Survivalists

Camille Acker

Training School for Negro Girls

S. A. Cosby

Blacktop Wasteland