Black Authors

Chlorine Sky

By: Mahogany L. Browne

Narrated by: Mahogany L. Browne

Length: 2 hours 4 minutes

Abridged: No

A novel-in-verse about a young girl coming-of-age and stepping out of the shadow of her former best friend. Perfect for readers of Elizabeth Acevedo and Nikki Grimes.

"Mahogany L. Browne's debut YA ia an absolute masterpiece. It will leave you breathless." -Elizabeth Acevedo, New York Times bestselling author of The Poet X 

She looks me hard in my... Read more

The Awakening of Malcolm X

By: Ilyasah Shabazz & Tiffany D. Jackson

Narrated by: Landon Woodson

Length: 7 hours 54 minutes

Abridged: No

This program includes a bonus interview with the author.

The Awakening of Malcolm X is a powerful narrative account of the activist's adolescent years in jail, written by his daughter Ilyasah Shabazz along with 2019 Coretta Scott King-John Steptoe award-winning author, Tiffany D. Jackson.

No one can be at peace until he has his freedom.

In... Read more

How to Fail at Flirting

By: Denise Williams

Narrated by: January LaVoy

Length: 9 hours 5 minutes

Abridged: No

"A warm romance that bursts with realism and celebrates the symbiotic power of love and healing.”―Entertainment Weekly

#1 LibraryReads Pick
Indie Next Pick

One daring to-do list and a crash course in flirtation turn a Type A overachiever’s world upside down.

When her flailing department lands on the university's chopping block, Professor Naya... Read more

This Is Your Time

By: Ruby Bridges

Narrated by: Ruby Bridges

Length: 13 minutes

Abridged: No

Inspired by the recent wave of activism led by young people fighting for racial justice, civil rights icon Ruby Bridges--who, at the age of six, was the first black child to integrate an all-white elementary school in New Orleans--shares her story and offers a powerful call to action with this elegant gift book.

Written as a letter from civil... Read more

Stakes Is High

By: Mychal Denzel Smith

Narrated by: Mychal Denzel Smith

Length: 3 hours 30 minutes

Abridged: No

Brave, clear-eyed, and passionate, Stakes Is High is the book we need to guide us past crisis mode and through an uncertain future.

The events of the past decade have forced us to reckon with who we are and who we want to be. We have been invested in a set of beliefs about our American identity: our exceptionalism, the inevitable rightness of our... Read more

The Beauty in Breaking

By: Michele Harper

Narrated by: Nicole Lewis

Length: 7 hours 46 minutes

Abridged: No

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

A New York Times Notable Book

“Riveting, heartbreaking, sometimes difficult, always inspiring.” —The New York Times Book Review

“An incredibly moving memoir about what it means to be a doctor.” —Ellen Pompeo

As seen/heard on Fresh Air, The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, NBC Nightly News, MSNBC, Weekend Edition, and more

An... Read more

Saving Ruby King

By: Catherine Adel West

Narrated by: Kim Staunton, Imani Parks, Ron Butler, Adam Laz...

Length: 10 hours 14 minutes

Abridged: No

Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2020 by Ms. Magazine, USA Today Book Riot, The Rumpus, Library Journal, PureWow, The Every Girl, Parade and more.

“Forever and to the end. That’s what they say instead of I love you.”

When Ruby King’s mother is found murdered in their home in Chicago’s South Side, the police dismiss it as another act of violence in... Read more

Real Men Knit

By: Kwana Jackson

Narrated by: Keylor Leigh

Length: 8 hours 52 minutes

Abridged: No

"If you're looking for an easy charmer, this is the novel for you."—Shondaland
 
When their foster-turned-adoptive mother suddenly dies, four brothers struggle to keep open the doors of her beloved Harlem knitting shop.

Jesse Strong is known for two things: his devotion to his adoptive mom, Mama Joy, and his reputation for breaking hearts. When... Read more

A Deadly Inside Scoop

By: Abby Collette

Narrated by: Joell A. Jacob & Chandra Skyye

Length: 9 hours 51 minutes

Abridged: No

This book kicks off a charming cozy mystery series set in an ice cream shop—with a fabulous cast of quirky characters.



Recent MBA grad Bronwyn Crewse has just taken over her family's ice cream shop in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, and she's going back to basics. Win is renovating Crewse Creamery to restore its former glory, and filling the menu with... Read more

Lakewood

By: Megan Giddings

Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo

Length: 8 hours 33 minutes

Abridged: No

A startling debut about class and race, Lakewood evokes a terrifying world of medical experimentation—part The Handmaid’s Tale, part The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.One of The Millions’ Most Anticipated Reads (The Great First Half 2020 Books)When Lena Johnson’s beloved grandmother dies, and the full extent of the family debt is revealed,... Read more

Everywhere You Don't Belong

By: Gabriel Bump

Narrated by: Korey Jackson

Length: 7 hours 15 minutes

Abridged: No

"This book is astonishing. You'll be smiling even as your heart is breaking, and you'll tip willingly into this world Bump offers you, because what appears again and again are spectacular beams of light also called love, also called hope, also called family. Gabriel Bump has established himself as a stunning talent to be reckoned with." -Maaza... Read more

Not the Girl You Marry

By: Andie J. Christopher

Narrated by: January LaVoy

Length: 8 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days gets a millennial makeover in this romantic comedy by USA Today bestselling author Andie J. Christopher.

“The way Jack sets out to win Hannah back is really the stuff of true romance.”—NPR

Jack Nolan is a gentleman, a journalist, and unlucky in love. His viral success has pigeon-holed him as the how-to guy for a buzzy,... Read more

For Black Girls Like Me

By: Mariama Lockington

Narrated by: Imani Parks

Length: 6 hours 34 minutes

Abridged: No

I am a girl but most days I feel like a question mark.

Makeda June Kirkland is eleven-years-old, adopted, and black. Her parents and big sister are white, and even though she loves her family very much, Makeda often feels left out. When Makeda's family moves from Maryland to New Mexico, she leaves behind her best friend, Lena- the only other... Read more

A Terrible Thing to Waste

By: Harriet A. Washington

Narrated by: Ron Butler

Length: 10 hours 13 minutes

Abridged: No

A "powerful and indispensable" look at the devastating consequences of environmental racism (Gerald Markowitz) -- and what we can do to remedy its toxic effects on marginalized communities.
Did you know...
Middle-class African American households with incomes between $50,000 and $60,000 live in neighborhoods that are more polluted than those of... Read more

Patsy

By: Nicole Dennis-Benn

Narrated by: Sharon Gordon

Length: 17 hours 9 minutes

Abridged: No

When Patsy gets her long-coveted visa to America, it comes after years of yearning to leave Pennyfield, the beautiful but impoverished Jamaican town where she was raised. More than anything, Patsy wishes to be reunited with her oldest friend, Cicely, whose letters arrive from New York steeped in the promise of a happier life and the possible... Read more

Across That Bridge

By: John Lewis

Narrated by: Keith David

Length: 5 hours 27 minutes

Abridged: No

From celebrated Congressman John Lewis comes an eyewitness account of history from a key member of the Civil Rights Movement and confidant to Martin Luther King Jr.

In turbulent times Americans look to the Civil Rights Movement as the apotheosis of political expression. As we confront a startling rise in racism and hate speech and remain a... Read more

The World According to Fannie Davis

By: Bridgett M. Davis

Narrated by: Bridgett M. Davis

Length: 10 hours 14 minutes

Abridged: No

As seen on the Today Show: This true story of an unforgettable mother, her devoted daughter, and their life in the Detroit numbers of the 1960s and 1970s highlights "the outstanding humanity of black America" (James McBride).
In 1958, the very same year that an unknown songwriter named Berry Gordy borrowed $800 to found Motown Records, a pretty... Read more

Harbor Me

By: Jacqueline Woodson

Narrated by: N'Jameh Camara, Jacqueline Woodson, Toshi Widof...

Length: 3 hours 49 minutes

Abridged: No

Jacqueline Woodson is the 2018-2019 National Ambassador for Young People's Literature

Jacqueline Woodson's first middle-grade novel since National Book Award winner Brown Girl Dreaming celebrates the healing that can occur when a group of students share their stories.

It all starts when six kids have to meet for a weekly chat--by themselves, with... Read more

The Black and the Blue

By: Matthew Horace & Ron Harris

Narrated by: Matthew Horace

Length: 9 hours 29 minutes

Abridged: No

During his 28-year career, Matthew Horace rose through the ranks from a police officer working the beat to a federal agent working criminal cases in some of the toughest communities in America to a highly decorated federal law enforcement executive managing high-profile investigations nationwide. Yet it was not until seven years into his... Read more

If You Come Softly

By: Jacqueline Woodson

Narrated by: Jorjeana Marie, Guy Lockard & Jacqueline Woodson

Length: 3 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

A lyrical story of star-crossed love perfect for readers of The Hate U Give, by National Ambassador for Children’s Literature Jacqueline Woodson--now celebrating its twentieth anniversary, and including a new preface by the author

Jeremiah feels good inside his own skin. That is, when he's in his own Brooklyn neighborhood. But now he's going to... Read more

My Journey with Maya

By: Tavis Smiley

Narrated by: Tavis Smiley

Length: 4 hours 20 minutes

Abridged: No

A remarkable story of friendship, love, and courage.

When Maya Angelou and Tavis Smiley met in 1986, he was twenty-one and she was fifty-eight. For the next twenty-eight years, they shared an unlikely, special bond. Angelou was a teacher and a maternal figure to Smiley, and they talked often, of art, politics, history, race, religion, music,... Read more

Another Country

By: James Baldwin

Narrated by: Dion Graham

Length: 16 hours 13 minutes

Abridged: No

Published in 1962, this is an emotionally intense novel of love, hatred, race, and America in the 1950s. Set in Greenwich Village, Harlem, and France, among other locales, Another Country tells the story of the suicide of jazz musician Rufus Scott and the friends who search for an understanding of his life and death, discovering uncomfortable... Read more

Gather Me

By: Glory Edim

Narrated by: Glory Edim

Length: 8 hours 5 minutes

Abridged: No

A “dramatic [and] ingeniously crafted” (Los Angeles Times) memoir of family, community, and resilience, and an ode to the power of books to help us understand ourselves, from the renowned founder of Well-Read Black Girl.

“A beautiful portrait of a full life that has been buoyed by an expansive and ever-growing love for words and for... Read more

The Beautiful Dream

By: Atiba Hutchinson

Narrated by: Odario Williams

Length: 9 hours 50 minutes

Abridged: No

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

“A captivating read from one of our country’s greatest athletes.”
―Christine Sinclair, former captain of the Canadian Women's National Soccer Team and National Bestselling Author of Playing the Long Game


Out of the Toronto suburb of Brampton comes an irresistible story of trials, perseverance, the limelight of international... Read more