This collection of essays by scholar-activist W.E.B. Du Bois is a masterpiece in the African American canon. Du Bois, arguably the most influential African American leader of the early twentieth century, offers insightful commentary on black history, racism, and the struggles of black Americans following emancipation. In his groundbreaking work, the author presciently writes that "the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line,"...

The adventures of Peter, a little boy in the city on a very snowy day. No book has captured the magic and sense of possibility of the first snowfall better than this book. With its universal appeal, the story has become a favorite with millions, as it reveals a child's wonder at a new world, and the hope of capturing and keeping that wonder forever. -- Publisher description.

After Paul D. finds his old slave friend Sethe in Ohio and moves in with her and her daughter Denver, a strange girl comes along by the name of "Beloved." Sethe and Denver take her in and then strange things begin to happen. Set in rural Ohio several years after the Civil War, this profoundly affecting chronicle of slavery and its aftermath is Toni Morrison's greatest novel, a dazzling achievement, and the most spellbinding reading experience of the...

When all of their special Saturday plans go awry, Ava and her mother still find a way to appreciate one another and their time together.

In this bravura follow-up to the Pulitzer Prize, and National Book Award-winning The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead brilliantly dramatizes another strand of American history through the story of two boys sentenced to a hellish reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida. As the Civil Rights movement begins to reach the black enclave of Frenchtown in segregated Tallahassee, Elwood Curtis takes the words of Dr. Martin Luther King to heart: He is "as...

In the Deep South of the 1950s, a color line was etched in blood across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. The author, a journalist decided to cross that line. Using medication that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his privileged life as a Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an unemployed black man. What happened to him, from the outside and within himself, as he made his way through the segregated Deep South...

Using primary sources such as tax records, journals and diaries, the author has reconstructed the lives of three generations of free blacks living in Hinesburgh, Vermont. This overlooked history is brought to life in such a manner that it will be an invaluable tool for anyone researching black history in rural Vermont.

"Ghana, eighteenth century: two half sisters are born into different villages, each unaware of the other. One will marry an Englishman and lead a life of comfort in the palatial rooms of the Cape Coast Castle. The other will be captured in a raid on her village, imprisoned in the very same castle, and sold into slavery. Homegoing follows the parallel paths of these sisters and their descendants through eight generations: from the Gold Coast to the...

Set in the remote mountains to the north, Broken Wing is an allegorical tale about a rusty blackbird with a broken wing who can't fly and therefore is trapped in the inhospitable north country for the winter, and a man, known only as The Man Who Lives Alone in the Mountains, who lives a solitary life of nurturing attentiveness, simple kindness, and passionate emotional intensity. Broken Wing is the story of how these two different lives come together....

"It opens in the year 1834 as a Black woman with magical powers named Saint founds a small settlement north of St. Louis with some slaves she has liberated, making the town invisible to the outside world by placing conjure stones around its perimeter; asthe inhabitants of the town discover, however, Saint has provided them safety but not necessarily freedom. As the next four decades pass, more characters enter the novel, including two young boys who...