Black History

Told through the eyes of Tish, a nineteen-year-old girl, in love with Fonny, a young sculptor who is the father of her child, Baldwin's story mixes the sweet and the sad. Tish and Fonny have pledged to get married, but Fonny is falsely accused of a terrible crime and imprisoned. Their families set out to clear his name, and as they face an uncertain future, the young lovers experience a kaleidoscope of emotions-affection, despair, and hope. In a love story that evokes the blues, where passion and sadness are inevitably intertwined, Baldwin has created two characters so alive and profoundly realized that they are unforgettably ingrained in the American psyche.

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"Showcasing the work of literary giants like Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Audre Lorde, Alice Walker and writers whom readers may be surprised to learn were "in the life," Black Like Us is the most comprehensive collection of fiction by African American lesbian, gay and bisexual writers ever published. From the Harlem Renaissance to the Great Migration of the Depression era, from the postwar civil rights, feminist and gay liberation movements to the unabashedly complex sexual explorations that followed, Black Like Us accomplishes a sweeping survey of twentieth century American literature."--Back cover.

In the inner-city African American community in which Michael Datcher grew up, he and the boys he hung with all lacked fathers or father figures. And yet, he argues, despite what the media might say about black men, the dream he and his male friends nurtured was the same dream as that of most Americans: to have a family, a house, love, stability. He calls it their picket-fence dream. Raising Fences is Datcher's story of his own experience of being black and longing for stability and family. But it's also the story of other young black men and how they turn their reality -- instability, violence, and a lack of male role models -- into that picket-fence dream.

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From the bestselling author of God Don't Like Ugly comes the eagerly awaited new title in the phenomenally successful God... series: a steamy, gritty page-turner that's among her best yet. After she's had an affair, Annette's husband, Pee Wee, wants to stay together for their daughter's sake. But when he starts an affair of his own that snowballs out of control, Pee Wee and Annette realise that their daughter is bearing the brunt of their actions. Putting their differences aside to keep her on the right track will test them in ways they never imagined.

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Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. Rufus, the white son of a plantation owner, is drowning, and Dana has been summoned to save him. Dana is drawn back repeatedly through time to the slave quarters, and each time the stay grows longer, more arduous, and more dangerous until it is uncertain whether or not Dana's life will end, long before it has a chance to begin. (Descriptive content provided by Syndetics™, a Bowker service.)

Abducted from Africa as a child and enslaved in South Carolina, Aminata Diallo thinks only of freedom--and of the knowledge she needs to get home. Sold to an indigo trader who recognizes her intelligence, Aminata is torn from her husband and child and thrown into the chaos of the Revolutionary War. In Manhattan, Aminata helps pen the Book of Negroes, a list of blacks rewarded for service to the king with safe passage to Nova Scotia. There Aminata finds a life of hardship and stinging prejudice. When the British abolitionists come looking for "adventurers" to create a new colony in Sierra Leone, Aminata assists in moving 1,200 Nova Scotians to Africa and aiding the abolitionist cause by revealing the realities of slavery to the British public. This captivating story of one woman's remarkable experience spans six decades and three continents and brings to life a crucial chapter in world history.

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"The tumultuous years after the Civil War are seen through the unique perspective of an escaped slave who became a sergeant major of the United States Cavalry. Deep in the plains of Kansas, on the brink of a bitter winter, Nate Gordon must aid the United States in clearing the frontier of hostile Cheyenne warriors, the feared Dog Soldiers. When not clashing with these seasoned hunters, or the prejudices of his commanding officers, he seeks comfort in thinking of his headstrong, beautiful lover, Cara, a Comanche Mexican woman who is also an escaped slave. From his escape from slavery aboard a Louisiana steamboat, to the horrors he witnessed at the hands of murderous Missouri bushwhackers, Nate has known adventures and hardships. Armed with the knowledge of his experiences, Nate must prepare himself to meet his enemies as he joins forces with some of the West's most legendary characters including: "Buffalo Bill" Cody, Kit Carson, and General George Custer. But Nate's battle becomes more personal when he discovers that Cara, pregnant with his child, has been kidnapped by her cruel former master"--Publisher's description.

"Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted. Their first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city's placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom." -- From publisher's description.

In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation's history and current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of "race," a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men--bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden?
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In July 2004, Barack Obama electrified the Democratic National Convention with an address that spoke to Americans across the political spectrum. One phrase in particular anchoered itself in listeners' minds, a reminder that for all the discord and struggle to be found in US history, the people have always been guided by a dogged optimism in the future, or what Senetor Obama called the audacity of hope.' In this book Obama calls for a different brand of politics - a politics free from the fear of losing, raising money and the media. A politics for the future.'

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In this epic, beautifully written masterwork, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson chronicles one of the great untold stories of American history: the decades-long migration of black citizens who fled the South for northern and western cities, in search of a better life. From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost six million people changed the face of America.
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Covering the history and contributions of black women intellectuals from the late 19th century to the present, this book highlights individuals who are often overlooked in the study of the American intellectual tradition.
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