American Chica
Two Worlds, One Childhood
Written by Marie Arana

Format: Trade Paperback, 320 pages
Publisher: Dial Press Trade Paperback
On Sale: May 28, 2002
Price: $16.00
ISBN: 978-0-385-31963-8 (0-385-31963-0)

***2001 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD NOMINEE - NON-FICTION***

***LIBRARY JOURNAL BEST BOOKS OF 2001 - NON-FICTION***

Now in Paperback.

Written in the tradition of Hunger of Memory by Richard Rodriguez, this is an informative and resonant portrait of a child coming to terms with her bicultural identity. American Chica explores the issues and difficulties that... Read more >

Dude, Where's My Black Studies Department?
The Disappearance of Black Americans from Our Universities
Written by Cecil Brown

Format: Trade Paperback, 160 pages
Publisher: North Atlantic Books
On Sale: May 15, 2007
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-1-55643-573-7 (1-55643-573-8)

Blacks have been vanishing from college campuses in the United States and reappearing in prisons, videos, and movies. Cecil Brown tackles this unwitting "disappearing act" head-on, paying special attention to the situation at UC Berkeley and the University of California system generally. Brown contends that educators have ignored the importance of... Read more >

The Central Park Five
The Untold Story Behind One of New York City's Most Infamous Crimes
Written by Sarah Burns

Format: Trade Paperback, 272 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: April 3, 2012
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-38798-1 (0-307-38798-4)

A riveting, in-depth account of one of New York City’s most notorious crimes.

On April 20, 1989, the body of a woman is discovered in Central Park, her skull so badly smashed that nearly 80 percent of her blood has spilled onto the ground. Within days, five black and Latino teenagers... Read more >

All God's Children
The Bosket Family and the American Tradition of Violence
Written by Fox Butterfield

Format: Trade Paperback, 432 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: January 8, 2008
Price: $16.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-28033-6 (0-307-28033-0)

A timely reissue of Fox Butterfield’s masterpiece, All God’s Children, a searing examination of the caustic cumulative effect of racism and violence over 5 generations of black Americans.

Willie Bosket is a brilliant, violent man who began his criminal career at age five; his slaying of two subway riders at fifteen... Read more >

Fist Stick Knife Gun
A Personal History of Violence
Written by Geoffrey Canada
Illustrated by Jamar Nicholas

Format: Trade Paperback, 144 pages
Publisher: Beacon Press
On Sale: September 14, 2010
Price: $14.00
ISBN: 978-0-8070-4449-0 (0-8070-4449-0)

A 2011 Great Graphic Novel for Teens (YALSA)

Long before President Barack Obama praised his work as “an all-encompassing, all-hands-on-deck anti-poverty effort that is literally saving a generation of children,” and First Lady Michelle Obama called him “one of my heroes,” Geoffrey Canada was a small and scared boy growing up in... Read more >

Our Town
A Heartland Lynching, a Haunted Town, and the Hidden History of White America
Written by Cynthia Carr

Format: Trade Paperback, 512 pages
Publisher: Broadway
On Sale: March 27, 2007
Price: $14.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-34188-4 (0-307-34188-7)

The brutal lynching of two young black men in Marion, Indiana, on August 7, 1930, cast a shadow over the town that still lingers; but is only one event in the long and complicated history of race relations in Marion, a history much ignored and considered by many to be best... Read more >

I Don't Wish Nobody to Have a Life Like Mine
Tales of Kids in Adult Lockup
Written by David Chura

Format: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Beacon Press
On Sale: February 22, 2011
Price: $14.00
ISBN: 978-0-8070-0123-3 (0-8070-0123-6)

Selected as a 2011 University Press Book for Public and Secondary School Libraries
•Rated O - Outstanding

A veteran teacher gives an “inside” view of the lives of juveniles sentenced as adults

David Chura taught high school in a New York county penitentiary for ten years—five days a week, seven hours a day. In... Read more >

Soul on Ice

Written by Eldridge Cleaver

Format: Trade Paperback, 256 pages
Publisher: Delta
On Sale: January 12, 1999
Price: $16.00
ISBN: 978-0-385-33379-5 (0-385-33379-X)

Originally published in 1968, Soul on Ice shocked, outraged, and ultimately challenged the way America saw the Civil Rights movement and the Black experience. Today this book remains a testament to Eldridge Cleaver's intelligence, insightfulness, and place in American history. Written while the former Black Panther Minister of Information was in... Read more >

Made in Detroit

Written by Paul Clemens

Format: Trade Paperback, 256 pages
Publisher: Anchor
On Sale: October 10, 2006
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-1-4000-7596-6 (1-4000-7596-3)

A New York Times Notable Book

A powerfully candid memoir about growing up white in Detroit and the conflicted point of view it produced.

Raised in Detroit during the '70s, '80s, and '90s, Paul Clemens saw his family growing steadily isolated from its surroundings: white in a predominately black city, Catholic in an... Read more >

Open City
A Novel
Written by Teju Cole

Format: Trade Paperback, 272 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
On Sale: January 17, 2012
Price: $15.00
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8009-7 (0-8129-8009-3)

Winner, 2012 PEN/Hemingway Award
Finalist, National Book Critics Circle Award (Fiction)
A 2011 New York Times Notable Book

A haunting novel about national identity, race, liberty, loss, dislocation, and surrender, Teju Cole’s Open City seethes with intelligence. It is a profound work by an important new author who has much to say about our... Read more >

Living and Dying in Brick City
An E.R. Doctor Returns Home
Written by Sampson Davis and Lisa Frazier Page

Format: Hardcover, 256 pages
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
On Sale: February 12, 2013
Price: $25.00
ISBN: 978-1-4000-6994-1 (1-4000-6994-7)

A riveting personal exploration of the healthcare crisis facing inner-city communities, written by an emergency room physician who grew up in the very neighborhood he is now serving

Sampson Davis is best known as one of three friends from inner-city Newark who made a pact in high school to become doctors. Their... Read more >

Book of Peoples of the World
A Guide to Cultures
Edited by Wade Davis, K. David Harrison and Catherine Herbert Howell

Format: Hardcover, 384 pages
Publisher: National Geographic
On Sale: November 18, 2008
Price: $40.00
ISBN: 978-1-4262-0238-4 (1-4262-0238-5)

As cultures and languages disappear from the Earth at a shocking rate, it becomes all the more urgent for us to know and value the world’s many ethnic identities. National Geographic’s Book of Peoples of the World propels that important quest with concern, authority, and respect. Created by a team of... Read more >

Zeitoun

Written by Dave Eggers

Format: Trade Paperback, 368 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: June 15, 2010
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-38794-3 (0-307-38794-1)

A New York Times Notable Book
An O, The Oprah Magazine Terrific Read of the Year
A Huffington Post Best Book of the Year
A New Yorker Favorite Book of the Year
A Chicago Tribune Favorite Nonfiction Book of the Year
A Kansas City Star Best Book of the Year
A San... Read more >

China Airborne

Written by James Fallows

Format: Hardcover, 288 pages
Publisher: Pantheon
On Sale: May 15, 2012
Price: $25.95
ISBN: 978-0-375-42211-9 (0-375-42211-0)

More than two-thirds of the new airports under construction today are being built in China. Chinese airlines expect to triple their fleet size over the next decade and will account for the fastest-growing market for Boeing and Airbus. But the Chinese are determined to be more than customers. In 2011, China... Read more >

The Obamas
The Untold Story of an African Family
Written by Peter Firstbrook

Format: Trade Paperback, 360 pages
Publisher: Broadway
On Sale: February 8, 2011
Price: $16.00
ISBN: 978-0-307-59141-8 (0-307-59141-7)

"Fascinating...adds many interesting details to what we know of the President’s heritage."
--David Remnick, TheNewYorker.com

On January 20, 2009, a few hundred men, women, and children gathered under trees in the twilight at K’obama, a village on the shores of Lake Victoria in western Kenya. Barack Obama’s rise to the American presidency had... Read more >

Root Shock
How Tearing Up City Neighborhoods Hurts America, and What We Can Do About It
Written by Mindy Fullilove

Format: Trade Paperback, 304 pages
Publisher: One World/Ballantine
On Sale: August 30, 2005
Price: $16.00
ISBN: 978-0-345-45423-2 (0-345-45423-5)

They called it progress. But for the people whose homes and districts were bulldozed, the urban renewal projects that swept America starting in 1949 were nothing short of assault. Vibrant city blocks—places rich in history—were reduced to garbage-strewn vacant lots. When a neighborhood is destroyed its inhabitants suffer “root shock”: a... Read more >

The Children

Written by David Halberstam

Format: Trade Paperback, 800 pages
Publisher: Ballantine Books
On Sale: March 30, 1999
Price: $18.95
ISBN: 978-0-449-00439-5 (0-449-00439-2)

A New York Times notable book The Children is David Halberstam's brilliant and moving evocation of the early days of the civil rights movement, as seen through the story of the young people--the Children--who met in the 1960s and went on to lead the revolution.  Magisterial in scope, with a strong you-are-there... Read more >

Shopping for Identity
The Marketing of Ethnicity
Written by Marilyn Halter

Format: Trade Paperback, 256 pages
Publisher: Schocken
On Sale: July 23, 2002
Price: $11.16
ISBN: 978-0-8052-1093-4 (0-8052-1093-8)

In America today, you can connect to your ethnic heritage in dozens of ways, or adopt an identity just for an evening. Our society is not a melting pot but a salad bar--a bazaar in which the purveyors of goods and services spend close to $2 billion a year marketing the... Read more >

Decoded

Written by Jay-Z

Format: Trade Paperback, 352 pages
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
On Sale: November 1, 2011
Price: $25.00
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8115-5 (0-8129-8115-4)

Expanded paperback edition of the acclaimed New York Times bestseller features 16 pages of new material, including 3 new songs decoded.

Decoded is a book like no other: a collection of lyrics and their meanings that together tell the story of a culture, an art form, a moment in history, and one... Read more >

Decoded

Written by Jay-Z

Format: Hardcover, 336 pages
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
On Sale: November 16, 2010
Price: $35.00
ISBN: 978-1-4000-6892-0 (1-4000-6892-4)

Decoded is a book like no other: a collection of lyrics and their meanings that together tell the story of a culture, an art form, a moment in history, and one of the most provocative and successful artists of our time.

“Hip-hop’s renaissance man drops a classic. . . . Heartfelt, passionate... Read more >

The Persistence of the Color Line
Racial Politics and the Obama Presidency
Written by Randall Kennedy

Format: Trade Paperback, 336 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: April 17, 2012
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-45555-0 (0-307-45555-6)

Renowned for his insightful, common-sense critiques of racial politics, Randall Kennedy gives us a shrewd and penetrating analysis of the complex relationship between the first black president and his African-American constituency.

Kennedy tackles such hot-button issues as the nature of racial opposition to Obama; whether Obama has a singular responsibility to African... Read more >

On the Down Low
A Journey Into the Lives of "Straight" Black Men Who Sleep With Men
Written by J.L. King and Karen Hunter
Foreword by E. Lynn Harris

Format: Trade Paperback, 208 pages
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
On Sale: April 5, 2005
Price: $14.00
ISBN: 978-0-7679-1399-7 (0-7679-1399-X)

"This is a revealing look at an important social and health issue."
--Booklist (American Library Association)

In the August 3, 2003 issue of The New York Times Magazine, writer Benoit Denizet-Lewis gave a brief overview of the secretive phenemonon known as "Living on the Down Low", or the DL. The article explored the... Read more >

Amazing Grace
The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation
Written by Jonathan Kozol

Format: Trade Paperback, 336 pages
Publisher: Broadway
On Sale: June 26, 2012
Price: $15.00
ISBN: 978-0-7704-3566-0 (0-7704-3566-1)

The author of Savage Inequalities, a New York Times best-seller, and Rachel and Her Children, winner of the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, tells the stories of a handful of children who have--through the love and support of their families and dedicated community leaders--not yet lost their battle with the perils... Read more >

Fire in the Ashes
Twenty-Five Years Among the Poorest Children in America
Written by Jonathan Kozol

Format: Hardcover, 368 pages
Publisher: Crown
On Sale: August 28, 2012
Price: $27.00
ISBN: 978-1-4000-5246-2 (1-4000-5246-7)

In this powerful and culminating work about a group of inner-city children he has known for many years, Jonathan Kozol returns to the scene of his prize-winning books Rachel and Her Children and Amazing Grace, and to the children he has vividly portrayed, to share with us their fascinating journeys and... Read more >

Ordinary Resurrections
Children in the Years of Hope
Written by Jonathan Kozol

Format: Trade Paperback, 416 pages
Publisher: Broadway
On Sale: July 24, 2012
Price: $16.00
ISBN: 978-0-7704-3567-7 (0-7704-3567-X)

In a stirring departure from his earlier work, Jonathan Kozol has written his most personal and hopeful book to date, an energized and unexpected answer to the bleakness of Death at an Early Age, the prize-winning classic that he published more than 30 years ago.

Like his most recent book, Amazing Grace... Read more >