Jackie Robinson

Alfred Duckett

* missing dust cover

In relating his life, Robinson reveals the struggles of a Black athlete in the white-dominated world of American sports

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Massachusetts

The Autobiography of Jackie Robinson

In relating his life, Robinson reveals the struggles of a Black athlete in the white-dominated world of American sports

I Never Had It Made

eb80f4e8-6640-40f4-a093-dee557282781-1

Hal Roth

Dust jacket has wear, but book and inside are decent. 

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

Oregon

The Longest Race

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No dustcover! #hardcover #historical #young-adult #race #1963

New York

It's 1963 and fourteen-year-old Esther Young is looking for excitement. Cursed with a lack of talent in a family filled with artistic types, Esther vows to get some attention by initiating a summer romance with a black teen accused of murdering a white man in Alabama.

King-Roy Johnson shows up on Esther's doorstep that summer, an angry young man who feels betrayed by the nonviolent teachings of Martin Luther King Jr. Sent north by his mother to escape a lynch mob, he meets a follower of Malcolm X's who uses radical teachings about black revolution to fuel King-Roy's anger and frustration. But with each other's help, both Esther and King-Roy learn the true nature of integrity and find the power to stand up for what is right and true.

National Book Award-winning author Han Nolan brings readers a bold new voice--by turns funny and poignant, innocent and worldly--in this powerful coming-of-age story set during the turbulent struggle for civil rights.


A Summer of Kings

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New Jersey

The Life of a Confederate General's Black Daughter

When Carrie Allen McCray was a child, she was afraid to ask about the framed photograph of a white man on her mother's dresser. Years later she learned that he was her grandfather, a Confederate general, and that her grandmother was a former slave. In her late seventies, Carrie McCray went searching for her history and found the remarkable story of her mother, Mary, the illegitimate daughter of General J. R. Jones, of Lynchburg, Virginia. Jones would later be cast out of Lynchburg society for publicly recognizing his daughter. FREEDOM'S CHILD is a loving remembrance of how Mary spent her life beating down the kind of thinking that ostracized her father. She was a leader in the founding of the NAACP and hosted the likes of Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois as they plotted the war against discrimination at her kitchen table. Carrie McCray's memories reward us with an extraordinarily vivid and intimate portrait of a remarkable woman. "Highly recommended for all readers."--Library Journal, hot pick; "I defy anyone to finish FREEDOM'S CHILD without a tear in their eye, a sense of meeting a great spirit, and an inspiration to act with generosity and justice."--Gloria Steinem; A BOOK-OF-THE-MONTH CLUB and QUALITY PAPERBACK BOOK CLUB SELECTION.

Freedom's Child

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Has sharpie on top of the book. But otherwise in great condition. 


A community in the Piedmont of North Carolina rises in outrage as a county initiative draws students from the largely Black east side of town into predominantly white high schools on the west. For two students, Gee and Noelle, the integration sets off a chain of events that will tie their two families together in unexpected ways over the next twenty years.

On one side of the integration debate is Jade, Gee's steely, ambitious mother. In the aftermath of a harrowing loss, she is determined to give her son the tools he'll need to survive in America as a sensitive, anxious, young Black man. On the other side is Noelle's headstrong mother, Lacey May, a white woman who refuses to see her half-Latina daughters as anything but white. She strives to protect them as she couldn't protect herself from the influence of their charming but unreliable father, Robbie.

When Gee and Noelle join the school play meant to bridge the divide between new and old students, their paths collide, and their two seemingly disconnected families begin to form deeply knotted, messy ties that will shape the trajectory of their adult lives. And their mothers—each determined to see her child inherit a better life—will make choices that will haunt them for decades to come.




What’s Mine And Yours

Richard Grant

Michigan

True Stories from Natchez, Mississippi

Bestselling travel writer Richard Grant offers an entertaining and profound look at a city like no other.

Natchez, Mississippi, once had more millionaires per capita than anywhere else in America, and its wealth was built on slavery and cotton. Today it has the greatest concentration of antebellum mansions in the South, and a culture full of unexpected contradictions. Prominent white families dress up in hoopskirts and Confederate uniforms for ritual celebrations of the Old South, yet Natchez is also progressive enough to elect a gay black man for mayor with 91% of the vote.

Much as John Berendt did for Savannah in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and the hit podcast S-Town did for Woodstock, Alabama, so Richard Grant does for Natchez in The Deepest South of All. With humor and insight, he depicts a strange, eccentric town with an unforgettable cast of characters. There's Buzz Harper, a six-foot-five gay antique dealer famous for swanning around in a mink coat with a uniformed manservant and a very short German bodybuilder. There's Ginger Hyland, "The Lioness," who owns 500 antique eyewash cups and decorates 168 Christmas trees with her jewelry collection. And there's Nellie Jackson, a Cadillac-driving brothel madam who became an FBI informant about the KKK before being burned alive by one of her customers. Interwoven through these stories is the more somber and largely forgotten account of Abd al Rahman Ibrahima, a West African prince who was enslaved in Natchez and became a cause célèbre in the 1820s, eventually gaining his freedom and returning to Africa.

Part history and part travelogue, The Deepest South of All offers a gripping portrait of a complex American place, as it struggles to break free from the past and confront the legacy of slavery.

The Deepest South of All

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"The first lick from Mr. Peterkin laid my back open. I writhed, I wrestled; but blow after blow descended, each harder than the preceding one. I shrieked, I screamed, I pleaded, I prayed, but here no mercy shown me. Mr. Peterkin having fully gratified and quenched his spleen, turned to Mr. Jones and said 'Now is yer turn; you can beat her as much as you please, only jist leave a bit o'life in her, is all I cares for.' " In the pages of this putative autobiography the author poses as a slave for the purpose of bringing attention to the injustice of slavery. The actual author Mattie Griffith, passing as a black, wanted her book to horrify and shame the nation.

Identifying herself as Ann, a former servant woman, she recalls her protected youth and good education as a nearly-white child. She tells that at twelve she was sold to a brutal master named Peterkin. On his Kentucky plantation she witnessed and experienced the cruelty of slave life. After his death one of his daughters took Ann to the city as her servant. Ann found new friendships there and fell in love with Henry, a slave who killed himself after being cheated out of his self-purchase. After being sold to an elderly Bostonian who emancipated her, Ann finishes her story as a schoolteacher for black children.

Pseudo-slave narratives like Griffith's appeared over the course of the abolitionist movement, and this is the only one now in print.

Born in Kentucky, Griffith was by inheritance the owner of six slaves. As a young woman she went north because she loathed the "peculiar institution." Living in poverty in Philadelphia, Griffith wrote Autobiography of a Female Slave to help finance her effort to emancipate her slaves and resettle them in free territory. She professed a keen knowledge of a slave's daily life and the brutal incidents a slave experienced. From this material she created her fictional story.

The novel failed commercially, although it was hailed within the abolitionist movement. The American Anti-Slavery Society soon afterward gave Griffith the funds to return to Kentucky in order to free and resettle her slaves.

Mattie Griffith (c.1826Ð 1906) has disappeared from American literary history. She remained a lifelong activist, first for abolition, and then for women's suffrage and for temperance. Joe Lockard is a doctoral candidate at the University of California, Berkeley.

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

Maryland

Autobiography of a Female Slave

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Kentucky

A Novel

" The Kindest Lie is a deep dive into how we define family, what it means to be a mother, what secrets we owe to those we love, and what it means to grow up Black. This beautifully crafted debut will keep you asking these questions and more." -Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Two Ways The Kindest Lie examines the heartbreaking divide between Black and white communities and plumbs the emotional depths of the struggles faced by ordinary Americans in the wake of the financial crisis, perfectly capturing the profound racial injustices and class inequalities roiling society. A promise could betray you. It's 2008, and the inauguration of President Barack Obama ushers in a new kind of hope. In Chicago, Ruth Tuttle, an Ivy-League educated Black engineer, is married to a kind and successful man. He's eager to start a family, but Ruth is uncertain. She has never gotten over the baby she gave birth to-and was forced to leave behind-when she was a teenager. She had promised her family she'd never look back, but Ruth knows that to move forward, she must make peace with the past. Returning home, Ruth discovers the Indiana factory town of her youth is plagued by unemployment, racism, and despair. As she begins digging into the past, she unexpectedly befriends Midnight, a young white boy who is also adrift and looking for connection. Just as Ruth is about to uncover a burning secret her family desperately wants to keep hidden, a traumatic incident strains the town's already searing racial tensions, sending Ruth and Midnight on a collision course that could upend both their lives. The Kindest Lie examines the heartbreaking divide between Black and white communities and plumbs the emotional depths of the struggles faced by ordinary Americans in the wake of the financial crisis. Capturing the profound racial injustices and class inequalities roiling society, Nancy Johnson's debut novel offers an unflinching view of motherhood in contemporary America and the never-ending quest to achieve the American Dream.

The Kindest Lie

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Indiana

Real American A Memoir 

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James Grippando

Texas

A Jack Swyteck Novel

From New York Times bestselling author James Grippando, a riveting, timely story ripped from the headlines. Defense attorney Jack Swyteck defends a white college student charged in Florida’s first racial terror lynching in more than a half century. When the body of Jamal Cousin, president of the pre-eminent black fraternity at the University of Florida, is discovered hogtied in the Stygian water swamps of the Suwanee River Valley, the death sets off a firestorm that threatens to rage out of control when a fellow student, Mark Towson, the president of a prominent white fraternity, is accused of the crime. Contending with rising political tensions, racial unrest, and a sensational media, Towson’s defense attorney, Jack Swyteck, knows that the stakes could not be higher—inside or outside the old Suwanee County Courthouse. The evidence against his client seems overwhelming. Then Jack gets a break that could turn the case. Jamal's murder bears disturbing similarities to another lynching that occurred back in the Jim Crow days of 1944. Are the chilling parallels purely coincidental? With each twist and turn, Jack is convinced that his client may be the victim of something even more sinister than the case presented by the state attorney. For Jack, it’s about the truth. And he’s determined to find it, no matter what the cost.

A Death in Live Oak

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A normal day. Until two siblings are accused of crimes they didn't commit. Come Home Safe explores the pain, the truths, and the hopes that come with growing up as a person of color in America, as well as why "the talk" and discussions about social justice are so important in the community. This engaging YA novel from ABC News legal analyst Brian Buckmire is told in a way that can help foster conversations about what it means to navigate today's world, as well as inspire ways to work toward change.

When Reed and Olivia left home, they never imagined they'd find themselves questioned, searched, and thrown to the ground by police looking for suspects in recent crimes. As their worst fears become reality, they must find a way to "prove" their innocence and make it home safe once again.

Come Home Safe is perfect for:

 * Fans of contemporary fiction and true-to-life stories
 * People interested in social justice and societal change
 * Parents and teachers looking to start a conversation and have "the talk" with their teens
 * Anyone looking to better understand America today

 

From ABC News legal analyst and NYC Legal Aid Society public defender Brian Buckmire, this compelling story draws from real-life advice, lessons, and conversations with attorneys, law enforcement, and the wrongfully accused to help turn the whispers and family discussions about racial inequality and mistreatment into wider conversations, healing, and one day ... change.

Come Home Safe

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#hardcover #fiction #mystery #action #contemporary #race #Britishliterature #cultural #adult 

'A moving, authentic, humane novel which raises fundamental questions about what it means to be kind in an unkind world' Guardian
____________________________________________

The Pizzeria Vesuvio looks like any other Italian restaurant in London - with a few small differences. The chefs who make the pizza fiorentinas are Sri Lankan, and half the kitchen staff are illegal immigrants.

At the centre is Tuli, the restaurant's charismatic proprietor and resident Robin Hood, who promises to help anyone in need. Welsh nineteen-year-old Nia, haunted by her troubled past, is running from her family. Shan, having fled the Sri Lankan civil war, is desperate to find his.

But when Tuli's guidance leads them all into dangerous territory, and the extent of his mysterious operation unravels, each is faced with an impossible moral choice.

In a world where the law is against you, how far would you be willing to lie for a chance to live?
____________________________________________


'Intelligent and heart-piercing - an exceptional novel about the Britain we live in, even if we choose not to see it' Kamila Shamsie, author of Home Fire

'Asks tough questions about the nature of goodness in an unfair society' Sunday Telegraph BOOK OF THE WEEK

'Lively, poetically written and above all compassionate' Sunday Times

'A female lead who isn't defined by a romantic story arc? Yes please. Lalwani's serious, ravishing way of writing about the secret life of Britain is just what we need' Times

You People

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Raven Leilani

Sharp, comic, disruptive, tender, Raven Leilani's debut novel, Luster, sees a young black woman fall into art and someone else's open marriage Edie is stumbling her way through her twenties—sharing a subpar apartment in Bushwick, clocking in and out of her admin job, making a series of inappropriate sexual choices. She's also, secretly, haltingly figuring her way into life as an artist. And then she meets Eric, a digital archivist with a family in New Jersey, including an autopsist wife who has agreed to an open marriage—with rules. As if navigating the constantly shifting landscapes of contemporary sexual manners and racial politics weren't hard enough, Edie finds herself unemployed and falling into Eric's family life, his home. She becomes hesitant friend to his wife and a de facto role model to his adopted daughter. Edie is the only black woman young Akila may know. Razor sharp, darkly comic, sexually charged, socially disruptive, Luster is a portrait of a young woman trying to make her sense of her life in a tumultuous era. It is also a haunting, aching description of how hard it is to believe in your own talent and the unexpected influences that bring us into ourselves along the way.

Luster

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Faith Ringgold

Acclaimed artist and Caldecott-winning picture book creator Faith Ringgold shares an inspiring look at America's lineage in this stunning ode to our country--past, present, and future.


America is a land of diversity. Whether driven by dreams and hope, or escaping poverty or persecution, our ancestors--and the faces of America today--represent people from every reach of the globe. And each person brought with them a unique gift--of art and music; of determination and grit; of ideas and strength--that forever shaped the country we all call home.

Vividly evoked in Faith Ringgold's sumptuous colors and patterns, WE CAME TO AMERICA is an ode to every American who came before us, and a tribute to the children who will carry its message into our future.




A timely and beautiful look at America’s rich history of immigration and diversity, from acclaimed artist Faith Ringgold, the Coretta Scott King and Caldecot Honor winning creator of Tar Beach. Vividly expressed in Faith Ringgold’s sumptuous colors and patterns, We Came to America is an ode to every American who came before us, and a tribute to each child who will carry its proud message of diversity into our nation’s future. America is a country rich in diversity -- From the Native Americans who first called this land their home, to the millions of people who have flocked to its shores ever since. Some of our ancestors were driven by dreams and hope. Others came in chains, or were escaping poverty or persecution. No matter what brought them here, each person embodied a unique gift—their art and music, their determination and grit, their stories and their culture. And together they forever shaped the country we all call home.

We Came to America - First Edition

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Ruby Bridges

Ohio

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * CBC KIDS' BOOK CHOICE AWARD WINNER

Civil rights icon Ruby Bridges--who, at the age of six, was the first black child to integrate into an all-white elementary school in New Orleans--inspires readers and calls for action in this moving letter. Her elegant, memorable gift book is especially uplifting in the wake of Kamala Harris making US history as the first female, first Black, and first South Asian vice president-elect.
 
Written as a letter from civil rights activist and icon Ruby Bridges to the reader, This Is Your Time is both a recounting of Ruby's experience as a child who had to be escorted to class by federal marshals when she was chosen to be one of the first black students to integrate into New Orleans' all-white public school system and an appeal to generations to come to effect change.
 
This beautifully designed volume features photographs from the 1960s and from today, as well as stunning jacket art from The Problem We All Live With, the 1964 painting by Norman Rockwell depicting Ruby's walk to school.
 
Ruby's honest and impassioned words, imbued with love and grace, serve as a moving reminder that "what can inspire tomorrow often lies in our past." This Is Your Time will electrify people of all ages as the struggle for liberty and justice for all continues and the powerful legacy of Ruby Bridges endures.

This Is Your Time

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A 1976 novel written by Alex Haley that tells the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African, captured as an adolescent, sold into slavery in Africa, and transported to North America; It follows his life and the lives of his descendants in the United States down to Haley. The release of the novel, combined with its hugely popular television adaptation, Roots (1977), led to a cultural sensation in the United States. The novel spent forty-six weeks on The New York Times Best Seller List, including twenty-two weeks at number one. The last seven chapters of the novel were later adapted in the form of a second miniseries, Roots: The Next Generations (1979). It stimulated interest in African American genealogy and an appreciation for African American history.

The Saga of an American Family

Roots

Marileta Robinson

This book is a clean copy with a good spine and binding. The contents and Graphics are in good condition. There is minimal wear inside. There is slight wear on the hardback cover. Will ship within hours after your order is received. Thanks for stopping by and please stay safe.

The Cabbage Patch kids celebrate the fourth of July with a picnic and a bicycle race that has a surprise winner.

The Big Bicycle Race

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Roxanne St. Claire

Wisconsin

He's fast. She's furious. They're in for the ride of their lives. Rising star Roxanne St. Claire puts the pedal to the metal in a story of intrigue and passion that will get your heart racing! When sexy NASCAR racer Beau Lansing tracks down high society debutante Celeste Bennett, it's a matter of life or death. Stunned at the secret Beau reveals, Celeste is forced to make a life-altering decision. But with her love life on the skids and her family life in a tailspin, escaping incognito into Beau's world is just what she needs -- especially if she can get answers about her past. Beau needs Celeste to save a man's life -- he never expected a high-octane attraction that could wreck his well-protected heart. And when Celeste's life is threatened by someone who clearly knows her real identity, Beau has to risk everything -- including his own life -- to save her. With menacing forces in the driver's seat and time ticking too fast, the two must win the biggest race of all...the race for their lives and their love.

Killer Curves

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California

A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK “A beautiful exploration of the often complex parameters of freedom, prejudice, and individual sense of self. Chibundu Onuzo has written a captivating story about a mixed-race British woman who goes in search of the West African father she never knew . . . [A] beautiful book about a woman brave enough to discover her true identity.” —Reese Witherspoon “Onuzo’s sneakily breezy, highly entertaining novel leaves the reader rethinking familiar narratives of colonization, inheritance and liberation.” —The New York Times Book Review An Amazon Spotlight Pick of the Month • Named a Best Book of the Month by Entertainment Weekly, Harper's Bazaar, and Time • Named a Most Anticipated Book of the Month by Goodreads, PopSugar, PureWow, LitHub, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, and Buzzfeed A woman wondering who she really is goes in search of a father she never knew—only to find something far more complicated than she ever expected—in this “stirring narrative about family, our capacity to change and the need to belong” (Time). Anna is at a stage of her life when she's beginning to wonder who she really is. In her 40s, she has separated from her husband, her daughter is all grown up, and her mother—the only parent who raised her—is dead. Searching through her mother's belongings one day, Anna finds clues about the African father she never knew. His student diaries chronicle his involvement in radical politics in 1970s London. Anna discovers that he eventually became the president—some would say dictator—of a small nation in West Africa. And he is still alive... When Anna decides to track her father down, a journey begins that is disarmingly moving, funny, and fascinating. Like the metaphorical bird that gives the novel its name, Sankofa expresses the importance of reaching back to knowledge gained in the past and bringing it into the present to address universal questions of race and belonging, the overseas experience for the African diaspora, and the search for a family's hidden roots. Examining freedom, prejudice, and personal and public inheritance, Sankofa is a story for anyone who has ever gone looking for a clear identity or home, and found something more complex in its place.

Sankofa

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Jewell Parker Rhodes

Inspired by real events -- the 1921 razing of the black section of Tulsa, Oklahoma, after a black man was falsely accused of raping a white woman -- this atmospheric, critically acclaimed novel of an American travesty reflects the powerful core of bigotry that still gnaws at our nation's heart.Magic City Tells the Tale of Joe, a Black Man Who shines shoes in a Tulsa office building, and Mary, a white farmer's daughter who runs an elevator in the same building. In pain and shock after being raped by the very farm-hand her father wants her to marry, Mary flees to the only safe place she knows -- her job. On the same day, while at work after an argument with his demanding father, an upset Joe decides to not walk the stairs to the colored bathrooms on the 14th floor. Ignoring the shocked stares of those around him, he takes the whites only elevator -- run by Mary. The doors close, the lift rises, and suddenly a scream rips the air. When the doors open, Mary is on the floor, her skirt around her thighs, and a concerned Joe is standing over her. As Joe flees in fear, the crowd, thinking the worst, does the only thing it knows: it grows into a seething mob that burns the black section of town to cinders. Dramatic, poignant, and beautifully imagined, Magic City is an unforgettable story of two people divided by race, but forever joined by fate.A mystical tale, full of spirits.... Rhodes' exciting and moving novel takes off at vigorous, lively clip from the first page, plunging through complex ideas and relationships without neglecting any of them. -- San Francisco Chronicle

Magic City

78a48ed8-bc03-4cdf-8c0d-a0015688b506-1

#socialmedia #activism #race #gender #humor #africanamericanwomen #hardcover #nonfiction 

Pennsylvania

memoirs and mistakes of an accidental activist

Well, that escalated quickly

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Scott Reintgen

Follows alchemists Imelda, Adrian, and Pippa as they reach for their dreams of glory riding phoenix horses at The Races, the modern spectacle that has replaced warfare within their empire.

Ashlords

399fa4de-d0d9-4a05-9a87-c9d5dea29356-1

David Chariandy

Florida

A Letter to My Daughter

In the tradition of Ta-Nehisi Coates's Between the World and Me and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, acclaimed novelist David Chariandy's latest is an intimate and profoundly beautiful meditation on the politics of race today.

When a moment of quietly ignored bigotry prompted his three-year-old daughter to ask "what happened?" David Chariandy began wondering how to discuss with his children the politics of race. A decade later, in a newly heated era of both struggle and divisions, he writes a letter to his now thirteen-year-old daughter. David is the son of Black and South Asian migrants from Trinidad, and he draws upon his personal and ancestral past, including the legacies of slavery, indenture, and immigration, as well as the experiences of growing up a visible minority within the land of one's birth. In sharing with his daughter his own story, he hopes to help cultivate within her a sense of identity and responsibility that balances the painful truths of the past and present with hopeful possibilities for the future.

I've Been Meaning to Tell You

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Gordon Parks

"A fine novel." THE BOSTON HERALD Photographer, writer, and composer, Gordon Parks has written a moving, true-to-life novel of growing up as a black man in this country in this century. Hailed by critics and readers alike, THE LEARNING TREE tells the extraordinary journey of a family as they struggle to understand the world around them and leave their mark a world that is better for their having been in it.

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Jackie Robinson; Alfred Duckett