The following is a list of African-American interest books for adult readers; compiled from publisher responses to our September Call for Information, these titles are publishing between September 2018 and March 2019. For a list of African-American interest books for young readers, please visit this page.
AKASHIC
Tigerbelle: The Wyomia Tyus Story (Sept., $27.95, paper $15.95) by Wyomia Tyus and Elizabeth Terzakis. A memoir Tyus’s 1964 and 1968 Olympic victories amid the turbulence of the 1960s, along with contemporary reflections.
ALGONQUIN
The Book of Delights: Essays (Feb., $23.95) by Ross Gay assembles a collection of short lyric essays, written over the course of a year, that celebrates both the simple and profound joys of daily living.
ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS
John Woman: A Novel (Sept., $26) by Walter Mosley recounts the transformation of an unassuming boy named Cornelius Jones into John Woman, an unconventional history professor—while the legacy of a hideous crime lurks in the shadows.
ATRIA
Everyday People: The Color of Life (Sept., paper $17) edited by Jennifer Baker presents an array of short stories, by established and emerging writers of color, which reveal the depth of the human experience.
Rap Dad: A Story of Family and the Subculture That Shaped a Generation (Sept., $26) by Juan Vidal. The musician-turned-journalist explores, in a personal way, the intersection of fatherhood, race, and hip-hop culture.
My Love Story (Oct., $28) by Tina Turner. The long-reigning queen of rock & roll sets the record straight about her illustrious career and complicated personal life.
ATRIA/37 INK
Standing Our Ground: The Triumph of Faith Over Gun Violence: A Mother's Story (Sept., $26) by Lucia Kay McBath. A mother’s memoir of raising, loving, and losing her son to gun violence, and how she transformed her pain into activism.
Taking the Arrow Out of the Heart (Oct., $25) by Alice Walker presents a timely collection, in both English and Spanish, of nearly seventy works of poetry that bears witness to our troubled times while also chronicling a life well-lived.
BALLANTINE
Well-Read Black Girl: Finding Our Stories, Discovering Ourselves (Oct., $20) by Glory Edim amasses original essays by black female writers and creative voices to shine a light on how important it is that everyone–regardless of gender, race, religion, or abilities–can find themselves in literature.
The Bold World: A Memoir of Family and Transformation (Jan., $28) by Jodie Patterson examines her extended families' African American experiences with racism and civil rights, her own coming of age in 1970s New York City, and her life as a wife, mother, and activist.
BEACON PRESS
A Treasury of African American Christmas Stories (Oct., $19.95) edited by Bettye Collier-Thomas collects little-known short stories and narrative poems, written between 1880 and 1953 by black writers, journalists, and political activists.
BERKLEY
The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls (Feb., $26) by Anissa Gray. Debut novel, told from the perspectives of three adult sisters coming to terms with their complicated family history.
BIBLIOASIS
Our Own Two Hands: A History of Black Lives in Windsor (Jan., paper $19.99) by Irene Moore Davis uses oral history interviews to recount the history of the black population–from the first arrivals on the Underground Railroad to the recently-arrived Caribbean immigrants–of Canada’s Windsor-Essex region, directly across from Detroit.
BLOOMSBURY
One Person, No Vote (Sept., $27) by Carol Anderson chronicles the rollbacks to African American participation in the vote since the 2013 Supreme Court decision that eviscerated the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and explores the organizing, activism, and court battles to restore the basic right to vote to all Americans.
A Bound Woman is a Dangerous Thing (Jan., $25) by DaMaris B. Hill bears witness to American women of color burdened by incarceration.
I've Been Meaning to Tell You: A Letter To My Daughter (Mar., $20) by David Chariandy. The son of Black and South Asian migrants from Trinidad draws upon his personal and ancestral past to to cultivate a sense of identity within his thirteen-year-old daughter.
CHALICE PRESS
Leaning In, Letting Go: A Lenten Devotional (Nov., paper $3.99) by Nicole Massie Martin. A 40-day Lenten devotional providing five-minute daily reflections to help experience the joy of God’s unfailing love.
Healing Racial Divides: Finding Strength in Our Diversity (Jan., paper $19.99) by Terrell Carter ponders whether the church can help America emerge from its racist shadow empowered to heal its racial divides.
CHELSEA GREEN
Farming While Black (Oct., paper $34.95) by Leah Penniman provides a how-to guide for aspiring African-heritage growers, exploring the relationship between farming, communities of color, the land, and our food system.
CHRONICLE
#1960Now: Photographs of Civil Rights Activists and Black Lives Matter Protests (Oct., $30) by Sheila Pree Bright combines portraits and documentary images of past and present social justice activists to shed light on the parallels between the 1960s Civil Rights Movement and the Black Lives Matter movement of today.
We Inspire Me: Cultivate Your Creative Crew to Work, Play, and Make (Oct., $19.95) by Andrea Pippins offers tips on how to reach out to your heroes; use your art or work to empower your community; learn about a new culture, take a class, join a team, plan brunch, all to shake up your perspective.
CLARKSON POTTER
Contact High: A Visual History of Hip-Hop (Oct., $40) by Vikki Tobak looks at the work of hip-hop photographers through their contact sheets, and features interviews and essays from industry legends alongside rare outtakes from over 100 photo shoots.
CONVERGENT
You Can’t Go Wrong Doing Right: How A Child of Poverty Rose to the White House and Helped Change the World (Jan., $26) by Robert J. Brown. The trusted advisor to some of the most influential individuals, corporations, and movements of the 20th and 21st centuries–including every American president since John F. Kennedy–shares lessons that speak to the dreamer in everyone.
CROWN
Becoming (Nov., $32.50) by Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her, from her childhood on the south Side of Chicago to her years at the White house.
CROWN/HOGARTH
The Old Drift: A Novel (Mar., $28) by Namwali Serpell. A mistake entangles the fates of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy, setting off a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families as the generations pass.
DA CAPO
Provisions: The Roots of Caribbean Cooking–150 Vegetarian Recipes (Oct., $30) by Michelle Rousseau and Suzanne Rousseau honor the culinary prowess of their African American female ancestors by drawing from family records and their own experiences.
Beyond the Call: Three Women on the Front Lines in Afghanistan (Nov., $27) by Eileen Rivers follows three American women soldiers in the US Army as they fought in Afghanistan and led Female Engagement Teams (FETs), helping empower and educate the local women.
DOUBLEDAY
My Sister, the Serial Killer: A Novel (Nov., $22.95) by Oyinkan Braithwaite delivers wry humor as it follows a Nigerian woman whose younger sister has a very inconvenient habit of killing her boyfriends.
DRAWN & QUARTERLY
Hot Comb (Mar., paper $21.95) by Ebony Flowers. A graphic novel short story collection about the culture of hair and how hair changes black women’s lives.
FIRST PRINT PRESS
The Sweet Flypaper of Life (Sept., paper $24.95) by Langston Hughes, photos by Roy DeCarava. First published in 1955 to honor in words and pictures what the authors saw, knew and felt about life in their city–and widely considered a classic of photographic visual literature–this fourth printing is the first authorized English-language edition since 1983 and includes an afterword by Sherry Turner DeCarava tracing the history and ongoing importance of this book.
FLATIRON BOOKS
Between Harlem and Heaven (Feb., $37.50) by JJ Johnson and Alexander Smalls serves up over 100 recipes in homage to the food and cultural significance of Harlem and the Afro-Asian diaspora.
FORGE
They All Fall Down (Mar., $26.99) by Rachel Howzell Hall. A psychological thriller involving a surprise invitation, a luxurious private island, and seven mysterious strangers competing for fame.
FRONT EDGE PUBLISHING
The Black Knight: An African-American Family's Journey from West Point -- A Life of Duty, Honor and Country (Jan., $27.99) by Clifford Worthy chronicles his experiences at West Point as a black man in the 1940’s who faced and overcame the racist obstacles of the U.S Military Academy to excel and serve his country.
Not Just Black and White: A White Mother’s Story of Raising a Black Son in Multiracial America (Jan., $24.99) by Anni K. Reinking, an academic researcher and mother of a biracial son, who recounts her experiences as the white mother of a black child who is striving to understand and prepare him for the world of racial bias and discrimination he will have to navigate.
GRAND CENTRAL
Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents (Mar., paper, each $15.99) by Octavia E. Butler represent newly reissued editions of two dystopian classics from the grand dame of science fiction.
GROVE PRESS
Solitary (Mar., $26) by Albert Woodfox. Known as one of the Angola 3, the author details how he survived four decades in solitary confinement for a crime he did not commit, how he was able to inspire his fellow prisoners, and emerge whole.
HARPERPERENNIAL
I'm Telling the Truth, but I'm Lying: Essays (Feb., paper $15.99) by Bassey Ikpi. The
Nigerian-American spoken word artist explores her experiences navigating Bipolar II that went undiagnosed for decades to becoming a mental health advocate.
HOWARD BOOKS
The Third Option (Sept., $26) by Miles McPherson. The founder of San Diego’s Rock Church speaks out about the pervasive racial divisions in today’s culture and argues that we must learn to see people as God sees them: humans created in His image.
Make It Work: 22 Time-Tested, Real-Life Lessons for Sustaining a Healthy, Happy Relationship (Jan., $26) by Tony A. Gaskins Jr. The celebrity life coach and motivational speaker offers principles, drawn from real life failures and successes, for building and sustaining a loving, healthy relationship in today’s trying times.
The Truth About Men: What Men and Women Need to Know (Feb., $26) by DeVon Franklin uses the metaphor of a dog that needs training to explore why behavior persists in men that can lead them to act against their vows, their integrity and even their character.
HQN BOOKS
Forget Me Not (Mar., paper $7.29) by Brenda Jackson delivers the latest installment in the new Catalina Cove series.
INTERVARSITY PRESS
A Sojourner’s Truth: Choosing Freedom and Courage in a Divided World (Oct., paper $16) by Natasha Sistrunk Robinson follows a young African American girl from South Carolina to the U.S. Naval Academy and into a calling as a speaker, mentor, writer, and teacher.
Can “White” People Be Saved: Triangulating Race, Theology, and Mission (Nov., $30) edited by Love L. Sechrest et. al. challenges evangelical Christianity to think more critically and constructively about race, ethnicity, migration, and mission in relation to white supremacy.
Church Forsaken: Practicing Presence in Neglected Neighborhoods (Nov., paper $16) by Jonathan Brooks challenges local churches to rediscover that loving our neighbors means loving our neighborhoods.
Twelve Lies That Hold America Captive: And the Truth That Sets Us Free (Jan., paper $16) by Johnathan Walton exposes cultural myths and misconceptions about America's identity, focusing on its manipulation of Scripture and the person of Jesus.
KNOPF
Washington Black: A Novel (Sept., $26.95) by Esi Edugyan. Adventure story follows a boy from the blistering cane fields of the Caribbean who rises from the ashes of slavery to become a free man of the world through self-invention, betrayal, love and redemption.
LIBRARY OF AMERICA
Ann Petry: The Street, The Narrows (Jan., $35) edited by Farah Jasmine Griffin. In one volume, two landmark novels–published in 1946 and 1953, respectively–from one of the foremost African American writers of the past century, addressing the terrible power of race in America.
Richard Wright: The Library of America Unexpurgated Edition (Jan., $70) edited by Arnold Rampersad presents authoritative new texts of Wright's landmark works based on his original typescripts and proofs, in the form in which he intended them to be read.
LITTLE, BROWN
The World According to Fannie Davis: My Mother’s Life in the Detroit Numbers (Jan., $28) by Bridgett M. Davis. A memoir of one unforgettable mother, her devoted daughter, and the life they lead in the 1960s and 1970s Detroit numbers game.
The Good Immigrant: 26 Writers Reflect on America (Feb., $28) edited by Nikesh Shukla and Chimene Suleyman. Essays, by first and second-generation immigrants, exploring what it's like to be othered in an increasingly divided America.
A Terrible Thing to Waste: Environmental Racism and Its Assault on the American Mind (Mar., $28) by Harriet A. Washington shows how environmental racism drives the black-white IQ gap and explains what can be done to remedy its toxic effects on marginalized communities.
A Woman’s Place: The Inventors, Rumrunners, Lawbreakers, Scientists, and Single Moms Who Changed the World with Food (Mar., $25) by Deepi Ahuluwalia and Stef Ferrari, illus. by Jessica Olah serves up a feminist history of food, with illustrations, recipes, and tales of women who broke the mold to change the way we eat–and to change the world.
MACMILLAN / ALL POINTS
Paper Gods: A Novel of Money, Race, and Politics (Oct., $27.99) by Goldie Taylor. Someone is terrorizing those who are close to Mayor Victoria Dobbs, and she can't shake the feeling that the killer is close to her, too.
Bending Toward Justice: The Birmingham Church Bombing that Changed the Course of Civil Rights (Mar., $29.99) by Doug Jones. How the author, a former U.S. Attorney, tried and convicted two former Ku Klux Klan members for their roles in the racially-motivated 1963 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing that took the lives of four girls, correcting an outrageous miscarriage of justice nearly forty years in the making.
MARINER BOOKS
Friday Black (Oct., paper $14.99) by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah. A debut story collection from a young writer, explosively voicing a surreal and heartbreakingly satirical look at what it’s like to be young and black in America.
MICHIGAN STATE UNIV. PRESS
New Frontiers in the Study of the Global African Diaspora: Between Uncharted Themes and Alternative Representations (Oct., $49.95) edited by Rita Kiki Edozie et. al. An anthology of multidisciplinary scholarship, addressing the connectedness of black subject identities, experiences, issues, themes, and topics, applying them dynamically to diverse locations of the black world—Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, and the United States.
THOMAS NELSON
Us Against the World: Our Secrets to Love, Marriage, and Family (Nov., $24.99) by David and Tamela Mann shares the story of their first encounters as teenagers, the importance of communication, and how they’ve been able to keep that spark burning through all these years.
Still in the Game: Finding the Faith to Tackle Life’s Biggest Challenges (Jan., $24.99) by Devon Still affirms that our challenges reveal our purpose, our scars make us stronger, and no loss is too great to stop our comeback.
Transformed: A Navy SEAL’s Unlikely Journey from the Throne of Africa, to the Streets of the Bronx, to Defying All Odds (Jan., $24.99) by Remi Adeleke recounts his journey from a childhood as Nigerian royalty, to years of making regrettable decisions, to a career in speaking and acting.
NEW PRESS
Free All Along: The Robert Penn Warren Civil Rights Interviews (Jan., $26.99) edited by Catherine Ellis and Stephen Drury Smith. Conversations, from the height of the civil rights movement of the 1960s, with vital historic voices including writers, political activists, religious leaders, and intellectuals.
Thick: And Other Essays (Jan., $24.99) by Tressie McMillan Cottom uses clever prose and southern aphorisms to illuminate a particular trait of her tribe: being thick.
Minutes Of Glory: And Other Stories (Mar., $25.99) by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o gathers short stories covering the period of British colonial rule and resistance in Kenya to the bittersweet experience of independence, and includes two stories that have never before been published in the United States.
On Intersectionality (Mar., $24.99) by Kimberlé Crenshaw gathers key essays and articles covering the trajectory of the subject over the course of two decades.
NEW SOUTH BOOKS
Crusader Without Violence (Oct., paper $23.95) by L.D. Reddick reissues the long out-of-print first biography of Martin Luther King, Jr., originally published in 1959 before he became an American icon but after he emerged from the 1955-56 Montgomery Bus Boycott as the spokesman of the 20th century American civil rights movement.
Closed Ranks: The Whitehurst Case in Post-Civil Rights Montgomery (Nov., $23.95) by Foster Dickson uses interviews, police reports, news stories, and other records to explore the fraught post-civil rights movement period when the "unnecessary" shooting of Bernard Whitehurst Jr. occurred.
NORTHWESTERN UNIV. PRESS
Anagnorisis: Poems (Sept., paper $18) by Kyle Dargan. The fifth collection of work by the critically acclaimed poet, offering a a painful illumination of the true nature of life as a black man in contemporary America.
Exit Strategy: A Play (Sept., paper $15) by Ike Holter both funnily and angrily follows a group of teachers who fight to keep their doomed high school open.
South Side Venus: The Legacy of Margaret Burroughs (Oct., paper $18.95) by Mary Ann Cain provides the first biography of legendary Chicago artist and writer Margaret T. Burroughs, cofounder of the South Side Community Art Center (SSCAC) and the DuSable Museum of African American History.
Ensemble-Made Chicago: A Guide to Devised Theater (Nov., paper $19.95) by Chloe Johnston and Coya Paz Brownrigg brings together Chicago theater companies to share strategies for cocreating work as an ensemble; includes company backgrounds, instructions for executing performance and writing exercises, and an overview of the politics shaping the development of ensemble-created work in Chicago.
New Perspectives on the Black Intellectual Tradition Classroom (Nov., $99.95, paper $34.95) edited by Keisha N. Blain et. al. offers twelve essays exploring black internationalism, religion and spirituality, racial politics and struggles for social justice, and black radicalism.
Ghost Voices: A Poem in Prayer (Dec., paper $16.95) by Quincy Troupe gives voice to the African ancestors lost during the Middle Passage by lacing mythical verse with touches of Yoruba, Candomblé Jejé, and American spiritual.
Sacred Ground: The Chicago Streets of Timuel D. Black (Jan., paper $24.95) by Timuel D. Black as told to Susan Konsky, edited by Bart Schultz. The personal memoir of famed Chicago historian Timuel Black, whose life and times from 1919 to the present capture pivotal moments in Chicago history as well as the civil rights movement in Chicago and nationally.
Teaching with Tension: Race, Resistance, and Reality in the Classroom (Jan., $99.95, paper $34.95) edited by Philathia Bolton et. al addresses how attitudes about race, impacted by our current political environment, have produced pedagogical challenges for professors in the humanities.
Sender: A Play (Mar., paper $15) by Ike Holter. A new comedy about millennials and the perils of adulthood by the winner of the Windham-Campbell Literature Prize for drama.
ONE WORLD
We Cast a Shadow: A Novel (Jan., $27) by Maurice Carlos Ruffin combines a keen satire of surviving racism in America with a moving family story.
A People's Future of the United States: Speculative Fiction from 25 Extraordinary Writers (Feb., paper $17) edited by Victor LaValle and John Joseph Adams offers twenty-five speculative stories that challenge oppression and imagine new futures for America, exploring new forms of freedom, love, and justice.
ORBIT
How Long Til’ Black Future Month? (Nov., $26) by N.K. Jemisin offers twenty-two short stories of destruction, rebirth, and redemption, four of which have never been published before.
OXFORD UNIV. PRESS
Let the People See: The Story of Emmett Till (Nov., $27.95) by Elliott J. Gorn uses new evidence and a broadened historical context to delve into how and why the story of Emmett Till still resonates.
PENGUIN PRESS
American Prison (Sept., $27) by Shane Bauer reckons with the nexus of prison and profit in America, in one Louisiana prison and over the course of our country's history.
The Last Pass: Cousy, Russell, the Celtics, and What Matters in the End (Oct., $28) by Gary Pomerantz. Out of the greatest dynasty in American professional sports history, an intimate story of race, mortality, and regret.
The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War (Nov., $30) by Andrew Delbanco explores how fugitive slaves drove the nation to civil war.
Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow (Mar., $30) by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. The struggle by African-Americans for equality after the Civil War and the violent counter-revolution that resubjugated them, as seen through the prism of the war of images and ideas that have left an enduring racist stain on the American mind.
PM PRESS
White Lives Matter Most: And Other "Little" White Lies (Sept., paper $14.95) by Matt Meyer. Essays revealing the successful strategies and methods of multigenerational coalitions used to free Puerto Rican and Black Panther political prisoners, confront neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, and many more.
PRINCETON UNIV. PRESS
Between Worlds: The Art of Bill Traylor (Oct., $65) by Leslie Umberger convenes 205 of Traylor’s most powerful creations, including some previously unpublished, revealing one man’s visual record of African American life as a window into the overarching story of his nation.
Basquiat-isms (Feb., $12.95) by Jean-Michel Basquiat, edited by Larry Warsh offers a collection of essential quotations on culture, artistic persona, the art world, artistic influence, race, urban life, and many other subjects from this godfather of urban culture, taken from his interviews as well as his visual and written works.
RANDOM HOUSE
To Obama: With Love, Joy, Anger, and Hope (Sept., $28) by Jeanne Marie Laskas interviews President Obama–the first president to interact daily with constituent mail and to archive it in its entirety–the letter writers themselves, and the White House staff who sifted through the millions of pleas, rants, thank-yous, and apologies that landed in the White House mailroom.
American Spy: A Novel (Feb., $27) by Lauren Wilkinson. Inspired by true events, a debut novel blending a gripping spy thriller, a heartbreaking family drama, and a passionate romance.
RESTLESS BOOKS
Passing (Oct., paper $19.99) by Nella Larsen, illus. by Maggie Lily presents the 90th anniversary edition of the classic Harlem Renaissance-era novel that explored identity, sexuality, self-invention, class, and race set in the Jazz Age.
SCRIBNER
Survival Math: Notes on an All-American Family (Mar., $26) by Mitchell Jackson
traces how his family managed their lives in and around drugs, prostitution, gangs, and imprisonment as members of a tiny black population in Portland, Ore., one of the country’s whitest cities.
SHADOW MOUNTAIN
Slave Stealers: True Accounts of Slave Rescues, Then and Now (Sept., $26.99) by Timothy Ballard follows two accounts, over a century apart, of people who fought human trafficking and sexual exploitation of slaves: the 19th century slave Harriet Jacobs, and the author himself.
ST. MARTIN'S
The Ancient Nine: A Novel (Sept., $27.99) by Ian K. Smith, M.D. Friends who are members of an exclusive Harvard all-male clubs investigate a secret that can endanger their own lives.
Sit Down and Shut Up: How Discipline Can Set Students Free (Sept., $27.99) by Cinque Henderson provides both a diagnosis and prescription on the issue of the deteriorating world of education.
For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Politics (Oct., $28.99) by Donna Brazile et. al. views American history from the vantage points of four women–Donna Brazile, Yolanda Caraway, Leah Daughtry, and Minyon Moore–who for over thirty years have worked behind the scenes in politics.
The Warrior Code: 11 Principles to Unleash the Badass Inside of You (Feb., $25.99) by Tee Marie Hanible. The first female military expert on American Grit offers a boot camp for aspiring badasses.
Queen Bey: A Celebration of the Power and Creativity of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter (Mar., $26.99) by Veronica Chambers gathers essays, from star academics to outspoken cultural critics to Hollywood and music stars, celebrating the Grammy-winning artist.
ST. MARTIN'S GRIFFIN
The Woman Trapped in the Dark (Sept., paper $17.99) by J. D. Mason. After a long battle to be together, Abby is looking to settle into a life of married bliss with Jordan–but when she’s taken prisoner, Jordan’s dark and murky past holds the key to her escape.
TEMPLE UNIV. PRESS
Meditating America: Black and Irish Press and the Struggle for Citizenship, 1870-1914 (Feb., paper $34.95) by Brian Shott shows how black and Irish journalists in the Gilded Age used newspapers to shape and constrain the struggle for American belonging.
TYNDALE MOMENTUM
13 Days in Ferguson (Feb., paper $16.99) by Ron Johnson. The law enforcement veteran shares, for the first time, his view of his days spent stabilizing the city of Ferguson, and the impact they had on his faith, his approach to leadership, and on what he perceives to be the most viable solution to the issues of racism and prejudice in America.
UNIV. OF CHICAGO PRESS
Ghosts in the Schoolyard: Racism and School Closings on Chicago's South Side (Oct., $22.50) by Eve L. Ewing delves deep into Chicago history to reveal that this issue is one more in a long line of racist policies.
UNIV. OF NEVADA PRESS
The Westside Slugger: Joe Neal’s Lifelong Fight for Social Justice (Jan., $34.95) by John L. Smith looks at the life of history-making Nevada lawmaker Joe Neal, who rose from humble beginnings during the Great Depression to become the first African American to serve in the Nevada State Senate.
UNIV. OF PITTSBURGH PRESS
I Can’t Talk about the Trees without the Blood: Poems (Sept., paper $17) by Tiana Clark explains why she cannot engage with the physical and psychic landscape of the South because for her, trees will always be a row of gallows from which Black bodies once swung.
Refuse: Poems (Sept., paper $17) by Julian Randall documents, against the backdrop of the Obama presidency, a young biracial man's journey through the mythos of blackness, Latinidad, family, sexuality and a hostile American landscape.
American Dream Deferred: Black Federal Workers in Washington, D.C., 1941-1981 (Dec., $32.95) by Frederick W. Gooding, Jr. challenges postwar narratives of government largess for African Americans by illuminating the neglected stories of these unknown black workers.
I: Selected and New Poems (Mar., $27.95) by Toi Derricotte recalls “fifty years of victories in the reclamation of a poet's voice.”
VERSO
The Common Wind: Afro-American Currents in the Age of the Haitian Revolution (Nov., $34.95) by Julius Scott describes the inter-continental communication networks that tied together the free and enslaved masses of the new world.
WYATT-MACKENZIE
Fairytale: The Pointer Sisters' Family History (Mar., $54, paper $37) by Anita Pointer and Fritz Pointer draws on photos, memorabilia, family stories and musical records to paint an intimate portrait of one of the top African-American female groups of all time–with social, political, cultural, racial, and female empowerment messages for a new generation.
ZONDERVAN
The Color of Compromise: The Truth About the American Church’s Complicity in Racism (Jan., $17.99) by Jemar Tisby explores how Christians have reinforced theories of racial superiority and inferiority, and motivates readers to take bold action to ensure a future of equity and justice.
