Anna Malaika Tubbs

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

California

How the Mothers of Martin Luther King, Jr. , Malcolm X, and James Baldwin Shaped a Nation

In her groundbreaking and essential debut The Three Mothers, scholar Anna Malaika Tubbs celebrates Black motherhood by telling the story of the three women who raised and shaped some of America's most pivotal heroes: Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and James Baldwin. Much has been written about Berdis Baldwin's son James, about Alberta King's son Martin Luther, and Louise Little's son Malcolm. But virtually nothing has been said about the extraordinary women who raised them, who were all born at the beginning of the 20th century and forced to contend with the prejudices of Jim Crow as Black women. Berdis, Alberta, and Louise passed their knowledge to their children with the hope of helping them to survive in a society that would deny their humanity from the very beginning—from Louise teaching her children about their activist roots, to Berdis encouraging James to express himself through writing, to Alberta basing all of her lessons in faith and social justice. These women used their strength and motherhood to push their children toward greatness, all with a conviction that every human being deserves dignity and respect despite the rampant discrimination they faced. These three mothers taught resistance and a fundamental belief in the worth of Black people to their sons, even when these beliefs flew in the face of America’s racist practices and led to ramifications for all three families’ safety. The fight for equal justice and dignity came above all else for the three mothers. These women, their similarities and differences, as individuals and as mothers, represent a piece of history left untold and a celebration of Black motherhood long overdue.

The Three Mothers

85900204-3249-4f38-91c9-8b1684ce94d0-1

Megan Giddings

Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

North Carolina

A Novel

Reminiscent of the works of Margaret Atwood, Shirley Jackson, and Octavia Butler, a biting social commentary from the acclaimed author of Lakewood that speaks to our times--a piercing dystopian novel about the unbreakable bond between a young woman and her mysterious mother, set in a world in which witches are real and single women are closely monitored. Josephine Thomas has heard every conceivable theory about her mother's disappearance. That she was kidnapped. Murdered. That she took on a new identity to start a new family. That she was a witch. This is the most worrying charge because in a world where witches are real, peculiar behavior raises suspicions and a woman--especially a Black woman--can find herself on trial for witchcraft. But fourteen years have passed since her mother's disappearance, and now Jo is finally ready to let go of the past. Yet her future is in doubt. The State mandates that all women marry by the age of 30--or enroll in a registry that allows them to be monitored, effectively forfeiting their autonomy. At 28, Jo is ambivalent about marriage. With her ability to control her life on the line, she feels as if she has her never understood her mother more. When she's offered the opportunity to honor one last request from her mother's will, Jo leaves her regular life to feel connected to her one last time. In this powerful and timely novel, Megan Giddings explores the limits women face--and the powers they have to transgress and transcend them.

The Women Could Fly

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Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

Texas

Minty A Story of Young Harriet Tubman

Farah J. Griffin

Farah Griffin

1st ed/1st printing. Never opened, almost no wear whatsoever.

Nebraska

In Search of Billie Holiday

Unravels the myths surrounding Billie Holiday and presents her as a dedicated artist who struggled with her own addictions and suffering to succeed as a singer.

If You Can't Be Free, Be A Mystery

5897ba93-3b17-46d9-9cea-5f33d9f496dc-1

Stanley Dance

Never opened. 1st/1st. Dust jacket has very mild edge wear, but binding, pages, etc are Like New

Dance is one of the most proficient and consistent jazz writers practicing today. In this book he follows the formula he developed in writing about the milieu of Hines, Ellington and others. It consists of numerous tape-recorded and edited interviews with musicians and vocalists associated with Basie and each gets to tell his own story. Many overlap and there are interesting confirmations and disputes over details.

World of Count Basie

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Testing the Ice

#history #biography #science #blackhistory #collegerec #educational 

New York

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

e7017c10-13fa-412e-8548-59cadeb2f164-1

Ibram X. Kendi

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Utah

A Community History of African America, 1619-2019

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A chorus of extraordinary voices tells the epic story of the four-hundred-year journey of African Americans from 1619 to the present—edited by Ibram X. Kendi, author of How to Be an Antiracist, and Keisha N. Blain, author of Set the World on Fire. FINALIST FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL • “A vital addition to [the] curriculum on race in America . . . a gateway to the solo works of all the voices in Kendi and Blain’s impressive choir.”—The Washington Post “From journalist Hannah P. Jones on Jamestown’s first slaves to historian Annette Gordon-Reed’s portrait of Sally Hemings to the seductive cadences of poets Jericho Brown and Patricia Smith, Four Hundred Souls weaves a tapestry of unspeakable suffering and unexpected transcendence.”—O: The Oprah Magazine The story begins in 1619—a year before the Mayflower—when the White Lion disgorges “some 20-and-odd Negroes” onto the shores of Virginia, inaugurating the African presence in what would become the United States. It takes us to the present, when African Americans, descendants of those on the White Lion and a thousand other routes to this country, continue a journey defined by inhuman oppression, visionary struggles, stunning achievements, and millions of ordinary lives passing through extraordinary history. Four Hundred Souls is a unique one-volume “community” history of African Americans. The editors, Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain, have assembled ninety brilliant writers, each of whom takes on a five-year period of that four-hundred-year span. The writers explore their periods through a variety of techniques: historical essays, short stories, personal vignettes, and fiery polemics. They approach history from various perspectives: through the eyes of towering historical icons or the untold stories of ordinary people; through places, laws, and objects. While themes of resistance and struggle, of hope and reinvention, course through the book, this collection of diverse pieces from ninety different minds, reflecting ninety different perspectives, fundamentally deconstructs the idea that Africans in America are a monolith—instead it unlocks the startling range of experiences and ideas that have always existed within the community of Blackness. This is a history that illuminates our past and gives us new ways of thinking about our future, written by the most vital and essential voices of our present.

Four Hundred Souls

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Wes Moore

One Name, Two Fates

The Other Wes Moore

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W. E. B. Du Bois

Randall Kenan

Cheryl Townsend Gilkes

Pennsylvania

First published in 1903, this extraordinary work not only recorded and explained history—it helped alter its course. Written after Du Bois had earned his Ph.D. from Harvard and studied in Berlin, these fourteen essays contain both the academic language of sociology and the rich lyricism of African spirituals, which Du Bois called “sorrow songs.” Often revealingly autobiographical, DuBois explores topics as diverse as the death of his infant son and the politics of Booker T. Washington. In every essay, he shows the consequences of both a political color line and an internal one, as he grapples with the contradictions of being black and being American. One of our country's most influential books, The Souls of Black Folk reflects the mind of a visionary who inspired generations of readers to remember the past, question the status quo, and fight for a just tomorrow. With an Introduction by Randall Kenan and an Afterword by Cheryl Townsend Gilkes

The Souls of Black Folk

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McDougal-Littell Publishing Staff

Wisconsin

The author writes of her childhood experiences with racism.

A Raisin in the Sun

e57f2ac2-2875-403f-879d-c9676c266f63-1

Ben Carson

Cecil Murphey

The Ben Carson Story

Examines the life and career of the famous neurosurgeon.

Gifted Hands

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Kaitlyn Greenidge

Missouri

Named One of the Most-Anticipated Books of 2021 by: O, The Oprah Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time, The Millions, Refinery29, Publishers Lunch, BuzzFeed, The Rumpus, BookPage, Harper's Bazaar, Ms., Goodreads, and more “An elegantly layered, beautifully rendered tour de force that is not to be missed.” —Roxane Gay, author of Hunger “Libertie is a feat of monumental thematic imagination.” —Margaret Wilkerson Sexton, The New York Times Book Review “This is one of the most thoughtful and amazingly beautiful books I’ve read all year. Kaitlyn Greenidge is a master storyteller.” —Jacqueline Woodson, author of Red at the Bone The critically acclaimed and Whiting Award–winning author of We Love You, Charlie Freeman returns with Libertie, an unforgettable story about one young Black girl’s attempt to find a place where she can be fully, and only, herself. Coming of age in a free Black community in Reconstruction-era Brooklyn, Libertie Sampson is all too aware that her purposeful mother, a practicing physician, has a vision for their future together: Libertie is to go to medical school and practice alongside her. But Libertie, drawn more to music than science, feels stifled by her mother’s choices and is hungry for something else—is there really only one way to have an autonomous life? And she is constantly reminded that, unlike her light-skinned mother, Libertie will not be able to pass for white. When a young man from Haiti proposes to Libertie and promises she will be his equal on the island, she accepts, only to discover that she is still subordinate to him and all men. As she tries to parse what freedom actually means for a Black woman, Libertie struggles with where she might find it—for herself and for generations to come. Inspired by the life of one of the first Black female doctors in the United States and rich with historical detail, Kaitlyn Greenidge’s new and immersive novel will resonate with readers eager to understand our present through a deep, moving, and lyrical dive into our past.

Libertie

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#paperback #africanamerican #history #Blackhistory #documents #religious #witness 

A Documentary Witness

This widely-heralded collection of remarkable documents offers a view of African American religious history from Africa and early America through Reconstruction to the rise of black nationalism, civil rights, and black theology of today. The documents--many of them rare, out-of-print, or difficult to find--include personal narratives, sermons, letters, protest pamphlets, early denominational histories, journalistic accounts, and theological statements. In this volume Olaudah Equiano describes Ibo religion. Lemuel Haynes gives a black Puritan's farewell. Nat Turner confesses. Jarena Lee becomes a female preacher among the African Methodists. Frederick Douglass discusses Christianity and slavery. Isaac Lane preaches among the freedmen. Nannie Helen Burroughs reports on the work of Baptist women. African Methodist bishops deliberate on the Great Migration. Bishop C. H. Mason tells of the Pentecostal experience. Mahalia Jackson recalls the glory of singing at the 1963 March on Washington. Martin Luther King, Jr. writes from the Birmingham jail.
Originally published in 1985, this expanded second edition includes new sources on women, African missions, and the Great Migration. Milton C. Sernett provides a general introduction as well as historical context and comment for each document.


African American Religious History

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Kenya Hunt

On Womanhood and Belonging in the Age of Black Girl Magic

In the vein of Roxane Gay's Bad Feminist and Issa Rae's The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, but wholly its own, a provocative, humorous, and, at times, heartbreaking collection of essays on what it means to be black, a woman, a mother, and a global citizen in today's ever-changing world. Black women have never been more visible or more publicly celebrated than they are now. But for every new milestone, every magazine cover, every box office record smashed, every new face elected to public office, the reality of everyday life for black women remains a complex, conflicted, contradiction-laden experience. An American journalist who has been living and working in London for a decade, Kenya Hunt has made a career of distilling moments, movements, and cultural moods into words. Her work takes the difficult and the indefinable and makes it accessible; it is razor sharp cultural observation threaded through evocative and relatable stories. Girl Gurl Grrrl both illuminates our current cultural moment and transcends it. Hunt captures the zeitgeist while also creating a timeless celebration of womanhood, of blackness, and the possibilities they both contain. She blends the popular and the personal, the frivolous and the momentous in a collection that truly reflects what it is to be living and thriving as a black woman today.

Girl Gurl Grrrl

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Mild bed at spine, but very crisp, clean pages.

African retentions in the blues

Savannah Syncopators

#hardcover #blackhistory #nonfiction #law #history #mafia

The Forgotten Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took down America's Most Powerful Mobster

The bestselling author delves into his past and discovers the inspiring story of his grandmother's extraordinary life

She was black and a woman and a prosecutor, a graduate of Smith College and the granddaughter of slaves, as dazzlingly unlikely a combination as one could imagine in New York of the 1930s--and without the strategy she devised, Lucky Luciano, the most powerful Mafia boss in history, would never have been convicted. When special prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey selected twenty lawyers to help him clean up the city's underworld, she was the only member of his team who was not a white male.


Eunice Hunton Carter, Stephen Carter's grandmother, was raised in a world of stultifying expectations about race and gender, yet by the 1940s, her professional and political successes had made her one of the most famous black women in America. But her triumphs were shadowed by prejudice and tragedy. Greatly complicating her rise was her difficult relationship with her younger brother, Alphaeus, an avowed Communist who--together with his friend Dashiell Hammett--would go to prison duringthe McCarthy era. Yet she remained unbowed.


Moving, haunting, and as fast-paced as a novel,Invisibletells the true story of a woman who often found her path blocked by the social and political expectations of her time. But Eunice Carter never accepted defeat, and thanks to her grandson's remarkable book, her long forgotten story is once again visible.

Invisible

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Zora Neale Hurston

Mary Helen Washington

New Jersey

"Belongs in the category ... of enduring American literature." -- Saturday Review Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person -- no mean feat for a black woman in the '30s. Janie's quest for identity takes her through three marriages and into a journey back to her roots.

Their Eyes Were Watching God

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Tanner Colby

Explore the intriguing story of integration in America with Some of My Best Friends Are Black by Tanner Colby. This book covers the 20th century American history and discusses the important topic of discrimination and race relations. It is a travel, history, social science, and political science book that is perfect for those who want to learn more about the United States' cultural and social background.

Published by Penguin Publishing Group in 2013, this trade paperback with 320 pages is a must-read for those who are interested in the topic of civil rights, anthropology, and ethnic studies. Its dimensions are 8.5 inches in length, 5.5 inches in width, and 0.7 inches in height. The book is written in English and weighs 10.6 ounces.


Kansas

The Strange Story of Integration in America

An irreverent, yet powerful exploration of race relations by the New York Times-bestselling author of The Chris Farley Show Frank, funny, and incisive, Some of My Best Friends Are Black offers a profoundly honest portrait of race in America. In a book that is part reportage, part history, part social commentary, Tanner Colby explores why the civil rights movement ultimately produced such little true integration in schools, neighborhoods, offices, and churches—the very places where social change needed to unfold. Weaving together the personal, intimate stories of everyday people—black and white—Colby reveals the strange, sordid history of what was supposed to be the end of Jim Crow, but turned out to be more of the same with no name. He shows us how far we have come in our journey to leave mistrust and anger behind—and how far all of us have left to go.

Some of My Best Friends Are Black

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#hardcover #historical #fiction #historicalfiction #bookofthemonth #botm #contemporary #blackhistory 

Bill Cole

Only very minor, superficial surface wear. Otherwise is good as new

Every critic, fan, and student of jazz who has listened to A Love Supreme or My Favorite Things knows that John Coltrane died entirely too young. But even within his tragically brief life, which ended in 1967 at the age of 40, he became one of the most innovative and experimental forces in African-American music. In this provocative study, musician and historian Bill Cole sharpens our focus on the legendary tenor saxophonist through the twin lenses of Africanism and spiritualism.

John Coltrane

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Jonathan Gould

Arizona

An Unfinished Life

When we think of Otis Redding, we remember his classic hits, from 'The Dock of the Bay' and 'Shake' to 'Try a Little Tenderness' and 'Respect, ' a song we often forget that he penned before Aretha Franklin made it famous. We know his music, yet we know very little about his life, which ended tragically at the age of 26, at the height of his career. According to Jonathan Gould, that knowledge gap is a shame because, while Redding might not have been as gifted as Ray Charles or as smooth as Sam Cooke, Otis - not Marvin Gaye, not James Brown, not Stevie Wonder - is 'the purest distillation of what we talk about when we talk about 'soul.' Now, in this biography, we'll finally get a fitting look at the unfinished life of the man some call 'the King of Soul.' That said, this book is not just about Redding and his music; it is also about the times from which they emerged

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Anna Malaika Tubbs

The Three Mothers

Megan Giddings

The Women Could Fly

Alan Schroeder & Jerry Pinkney

Minty A Story of Young Harriet Tubman

Farah Jasmine Griffin

If You Can't Be Free, Be A Mystery

Stanley Dance

World of Count Basie

Sharon Robinson

Testing the Ice

Rebecca Skloot

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Ibram X. Kendi

Four Hundred Souls

Wes Moore

The Other Wes Moore

W. E. B. Du Bois; Randall Kenan; Cheryl Townsend Gilkes

The Souls of Black Folk

McDougal-Littell Publishing Staff

A Raisin in the Sun

Ben Carson; Cecil Murphey

Gifted Hands

Wes Moore

The Other Wes Moore

Kaitlyn Greenidge

Libertie

Milton C. Sernett (Editor)

African American Religious History

Kenya Hunt

Girl Gurl Grrrl

Paul Oliver

Savannah Syncopators

Stephen L. Carter

Invisible

Zora Neale Hurston; Mary Helen Washington

Their Eyes Were Watching God

Tanner Colby

Some of My Best Friends Are Black

Kaitlyn Greenidge

Libertie

Zora Neale Hurston; Mary Helen Washington

Their Eyes Were Watching God

Bill Cole

John Coltrane

Jonathan Gould

Otis Redding