Showing results for "Life" in African American

The Secret Lives of Church Ladies explores the raw and tender places where Black women and girls dare to follow their desires and pursue a momentary reprieve from being good. The nine stories in this collection feature four generations of characters grappling with who they want to be in the world, caught as they are between the church's double standards and their own needs and passions.

In these brilliant new poems, Tracy K. Smith envisions a sci-fi future sucked clean of any real dangers, contemplates the dark matter that keeps people both close and distant, and revisits the kitschy concepts like "love" and "illness" now relegated to the Museum of Obsolescence. These poems reveal the realities of life lived here, on the ground, where a daughter is imprisoned in the basement by her own father, where celebrities and pop stars walk among us, and where the poet herself loses her father, one of the engineers who worked on the Hubble Space Telescope.

A FINALIST for the Booker Prize, the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, the VCU/Cabell First Novelist Prize, the Lambda Literary Award, the NYPL Young Lions Award, and the Edmund White Debut Fiction Award “A blistering coming of age story” —O: The Oprah Magazine...

“Strikingly dramatic, yet simple and unrestrained . . . an unusual and intensely interesting book richly packed with strange information.” —New York Times Book Review Based on Zora Neale Hurston’s personal experiences in Haiti and Jamaica, where she participated as an initiate rather...

Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller Instant USA TODAY Bestseller The long-anticipated sequel to Sister Souljah’s million copy New York Times bestseller The Coldest Winter Ever. Winter Santiaga hit time served. Still stunning, still pretty, still bold, still loves her father more than any man...

A 2025 Audie Awards WINNER | A WOMAN EVOLVE BOOK CLUB PICK | A NORTH CAROLINA READS PICK | A Christy Award WINNER | A 2024 American Fiction Award WINNER | Best Historical Fiction of 2024 (She Reads) | FEATURED IN GMA, WASHINGTON POST, AND ESSENCE | There is only one known queen who truly ruled a...

August Hanson was the silent type, the kind who spoke through his actions and not his words. He possessed enough power to make me feel safe and secure. I was ready to open up and share the parts of myself I’d never shared with another, and then I got hit with a truth that changed everything. There was a slight chance he’d still want me, only he had to accept our baby, too.

Since childhood, identical twins Leona and Fiona Dunbar have been getting in—and out—of trouble by pretending to be each other. Yet underneath, they couldn’t be more different. Outspoken Leona lives to break rules, have a good time, and scandalize their respectable hometown of Lexington. Fiona is a seemingly demure churchgoing girl who is the apple of her domineering, widowed mother Mavis’s eye. But together, the twins have fooled teachers, boyfriends, bosses, racist police—and most importantly, straitlaced Mavis.

James Baldwin (1924–1987) was a pivotal figure of the twentieth century, an influential author, intellectual, and activist who led a celebrated public life—and whose words and image and persona remain current in our culture. Baldwin's many incarnations have reemerged in the digital age as Baldwin's work becomes a touchstone for a new generation. It is the private, vulnerable, and messier Baldwin—the man behind the prophet and the online meme—who is the focus of this book.

Out of My Mind by Miki Conn is a collection of poems spanning 50 years of writing and observing everyday life. Conn's poetic debut, Out of My Mind is autobiographical and divided into five sections: Kitchen Wisdom, Love Found and Lost, People Watching, Death's Front Steps and True Religion. Each section reflects on the beauty, challenges, emotions and spirituality of everyday life. Miki is an artist, poet, storyteller, community organizer, grandmother and Priest of Oshun in the Yoruba Religious tradition, who expresses her life experiences through her creativity.

Wesley Batchelor is desperate for an image reboot—stat. A mysterious social media influencer keeps revealing his many reckless romantic liaisons, putting everything Wesley has worked so hard for at stake. Worse, he’s in deep trouble with his grandmother and Batchelor Enterprises boss, Joyce, his one and only true cheerleader. So he’s stunned and relieved when his gorgeous ex, private detective Albany Keyes, is recruited to track down the leaker . . .

Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by Ms. Magazine, The Root, Popsugar, Bustle, and many more! “An utterly absorbing and dazzling novel about the stories we tell to stay alive and the secrets we keep to protect ourselves.” — Nancy Jooyoun Kim, New York Times Bestselling author...

A man who once thrived on wickedness and counted on forgiveness, Curtis Black has changed his ways. Back in the heart of his congregation and his family, he will no longer stray from the beaten path. Or so he's promised his long-suffering wife, Charlotte. But the sins of the past have strange ways of coming to light. First, Curtis's former mistress shows up with their newborn baby daughter—named Curtina—and insists that Curtis be a part of their lives.

It was the season that brought families together for trick-or-treating and Thanksgiving dinners. But for Octavia Davenport, this season symbolized an era in her life when she lost everything. For years, Octavia was alone living a moderately single life, but then she met the owner of Rose Security Group, and suddenly things began to change. A blossoming friendship evolved, and with it came an unrestrained indulgence to connect with him on every level. Desire had never stirred her until him, and Octavia didn't want to deny herself what she so hungrily craved.

Once inseparable, now estranged—former best friends Jordan Rules, Milo Cyrus, and Ram Cruise haven’t shared a beat in years. But when a legendary Bay Area hip-hop contest offers a shot at the spotlight they missed in their youth, the trio reunites their old crew, “Trail Mix,” for one last chance at glory. To win, they'll have to overcome broken trust, personal demons, and the childhood bully who's back—and badder than ever.

At the heart of Harriet E. Wilson’s autobiographical novel is Frado, the young daughter of a mixed-race couple, who is exploited first by a middle-class New England white family and then by an opportunistic husband on the abolitionist lecture circuit. In adopting the nineteenth-century conventions of both the sentimental novel and the narratives of enslaved people, Wilson delivered a scathing and ironic indictment of the racism of the antebellum North.

After the arrest of Chancellor King and the murder of his eldest son and heir, Ghost, the King family and the streets of New York City are thrown into chaos. Chancellor’s older brother, Chapman, takes the opportunity to usurp the crown, breaking the line of succession and stepping over his nephew Shadow. Chapman’s first act as the new king is to banish what remains of his broken family, branding them enemies of the crown. Stripped of all wealth and power, Maureen King places a seemingly impossible task on the shoulders of Shadow.

Savannah Carlson has one month before she hits the big four-oh. With her best friends, Jamaica and Ronni, she’s making every weekend toward that milestone count—party-wise. Vanna’s plans go awry when her shady, no-good, unreliable, estranged husband, Caleb, dies in a boating accident. The real sucker punch lands when Vanna is arrested for embezzlement at his funeral. Her man certainly is the gift that keeps on giving.

Toni Morrison's Spiritual Vision unpacks this oft-ignored, but essential, element of Toni Morrison's work - her religion - and in so doing, gives listeners a deeper, richer understanding of her life and her writing.

A comprehensive biographical and critical reading of the works of American poet and memoirist Maya Angelou (1928-2014). Linda Wagner-Martin covers all six of Angelou's autobiographies, as well as her essay and poetry collections, while also exploring Angelou's life as an African American in the United States, her career as stage and film performer, her thoughtful participation in the Civil Rights actions of the 1960s, and her travels abroad in Egypt, Africa, and Europe.