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BLACK HISTORY MONTH: Must-Reads from 2019
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Freshwater
by Akwaeke Emezi
Traces the experiences of a deeply troubled young woman who alarms her devout Nigerian family as she succumbs to multiple personality disorder and begins to display increasingly dark and dangerous traits in accordance with her fractured personalities. A first novel.
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Not that bad : dispatches from rape culture
by Roxane Gay
Covering a vast array of topics and experiences, from an exploration of the rape epidemic embedded in the refugee crisis to accounts of child molestation, a series of authors, in this thought-provoking collection of first-person essays edited by the author of Bad Feminist, tackle rape, assault and harassment head on. 25,000 first printing.
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Such a fun age : a novel
by Kiley Reid
Seeking justice for a young black babysitter who was wrongly accused of kidnapping by a racist security guard, a successful blogger finds her efforts complicated by a video that reveals unexpected connections. A first novel.
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Red at the bone
by Jacqueline Woodson
As Melody celebrates a coming of age ceremony at her grandparents’ house in 2001 Brooklyn, her family remembers 1985, when Melody’s own mother prepared for a similar party that never took place in this novel about different social classes. (general fiction). (This book was listed in a previous issue of Forecast.)
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Black leopard, red wolf
by Marlon James
Hired to find a mysterious boy who disappeared three years before, Tracker joins a search party that is quickly targeted by deadly creatures, in the first novel of a trilogy from the author of A Brief History of Seven Killings
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Grand union : stories
by Zadie Smith
The award-winning author of White Teeth presents a first collection of 10 original short stories and selections from her most-lauded pieces as first published in The New Yorker and other prestigious literary magazines.
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The nickel boys : a novel
by Colson Whitehead
A follow-up to the Pulitzer Prize- and National Book Award-winning, The Underground Railroad, follows the harrowing experiences of two African-American teens at an abusive reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida
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The water dancer : a novel
by Ta-Nehisi Coates
A Virginia slave narrowly escapes a drowning death through the intervention of a mysterious force that compels his escape and personal underground war against slavery. By the National Book Award-winning author of Between the World and Me. Tour
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Girl, woman, other by Bernardine EvaristoGirl, Woman, Other is a celebration of the diversity of Black British experience. Moving, hopeful, and inventive, this extraordinary novel is a vivid portrait of the state of contemporary Britain and the legacy of Britain's colonial history in Africa and the Caribbean. The twelve central characters of this multi-voiced novel lead vastly different lives. Girl, Woman, Other is a polyphonic and richly textured social novel that reminds us of everything that connects us to our neighbors, even in times when we are encouraged to be split apart
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American spy : a novel
by Lauren Wilkinson
A Cold War FBI intelligence officer joins an undercover task force to seduce a revolutionary African Communist president she secretly admires and comes to love, in a story inspired by true events. A first novel.
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We cast a shadow : a novel
by Maurice Carlos Ruffin
In a near-future South where an increasing number of people with dark skin endure cosmetic procedures to pass as white, a father embarks on an obsessive quest to protect his son, who bears a dark, spreading birthmark. A first novel.
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My sister, the serial killer
by Oyinkan Braithwaite
Realizing that her beautiful, beloved younger sister has murdered yet another boyfriend, an embittered Nigerian woman works to direct suspicion away from the family, until a handsome doctor she fancies asks for her sister's number
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The care and feeding of ravenously hungry girls
by Anissa Gray
When their formidably strong-willed eldest sister is arrested, abruptly transitioning their family from respectability to disgrace, two younger sisters confront complicated dynamics in their family and identities to uncover what really happened.
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Gingerbread
by Helen Oyeyemi
The award-winning author of Boy, Snow, Bird draws on the classic fairy-tale element of gingerbread in the story of a British family whose surprising legacy and secret past are tied to a favorite recipe
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In West Mills : a novel
by De'Shawn Charles Winslow
A woman in mid-20th-century rural North Carolina, determined to live on her own terms in spite of community gossip, finds unexpected support from a veteran fixer who struggles with an inability to correct his own troubled past.
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Yellow house
by Sarah M. Broom
Describes the author’s upbringing in a New Orleans East shotgun house as the unruly 13th child of a widowed mother, tracing a century of family history and the impact of class, race and Hurricane Katrina on her sense of identity.
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The deep
by Rivers Solomon
The historian of the water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slaves thrown overboard by slavers keeps all the memories of her people both painful and miraculous, until she discovers that their future lies in returning to the past. 100,000 first printing.
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An orchestra of minorities : a novel
by Chigozie Obioma
In a contemporary twist of Homer's The Odyssey, a guardian spirit recounts the tragic story of a Nigerian poultry farmer who sacrifices everything for the wealthy woman he loves. By the award-winning author of The Fishermen. 50,000 first printing
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