African American Historical Fiction

Five-year-old Clara Bynum is dead, drowned in the Potomac River in the shadow of a seemingly haunted rock outcropping known locally as the Three Sisters. River, Cross My Heart weighs the effect of Clara's absence on the people she has left behind: her parents; the friends and relatives of the Bynum family; and, most especially, Clara's sister, 10-year-old Johnnie Mae, who must come to terms with the powerful and confused emotions stirred by her sister's death as she struggles to decide what kind of woman she will become.

“A debut of enormous ambition” spanning eight generations of a Black family in West Tennessee as they are repeatedly visited by the Devil (Nathan Harris, New York Times bestselling author of The Sweetness of Water) Yetunde awakens aboard a slave ship en route to the United States with the...

It's 1876 and Dr. Viveca Lancaster is frustrated by the limits placed upon female physicians of color. When she is offered the chance to set up a practice in the small all-black community of Grayson Grove, Michigan, she leaves her California home and heads east. The very determined Viveca knows all about fighting for her rights. But she may need more than determination to face down the distractingly handsome Nate Grayson, the Grove's bull-headed mayor.

It is 1968. Lynnie, a young white woman with a developmental disability, and Homan, an African American deaf man, are locked away in an institution, the School for the Incurable and Feebleminded, and have been left to languish, forgotten. Deeply in love, they escape, and find refuge in the...

Fleeing persecution in 1960s America, a Black couple seeks asylum in Ghana, but fresh dangers and old secrets threaten their newfound freedom in this hypnotic debut novel. “I am truly blown away by this novel.”—Jacqueline Woodson, New York Times bestselling author of Red at the Bone ONE OF...

Combining the haunting power of Toni Morrison’s Beloved with the evocative atmosphere of Phillippa Gregory’s A Respectable Trade, Dahlma Llanos-Figueroa’s groundbreaking novel illuminates a little discussed aspect of history—the Puerto Rican Atlantic Slave Trade—witnessed through the...

Devoted wife, White House maid, reluctant activist… A stirring novel inspired by the life of an unsung heroine, and real-life crusader, Lizzie McDuffie, who as a maid in FDR’s White House spearheaded the Civil Rights movement of her time. I’m just a college-educated Southerner with a...

“What a beautifully imagined and important narrative. Sanders’ clear-eyed and powerful writing made this a hard one to stop reading!” —Jacqueline Woodson, National Book Award-Winning Author "This is a novel to cherish and share. And this is a history to sing about and affirm -- to...

Three women uncover the secrets of a Georgia plantation that embodies the intertwined histories of Indigenous and enslaved Black communities—the fascinating debut novel, inspired by a true story, of the National Book Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author of All That She Carried...

Easy Rawlins mysteries--original short stories from the New York Times bestselling and award-winning mystery author. As Carolyn See said in The Washington Post Book World: "God bless the day that Walter Mosley created Easy Rawlins!" This handsome collection contains six interconnected stories...

For fans of Bridgerton and The Davenports comes a sweeping historical novel from bestselling author Veronica Chambers about courageous (and flirtatious) Ida B. Wells as she navigates society parties and society prejudices to become a civil rights crusader. Before she became a warrior, Ida B...

ONE OF TIME'S 100 MUST-READ BOOKS OF 2024 "An evocative, touching, and--in multiple senses--moving portrait of Zambian life and politics at a moment of great transformation. And in the tradition of Zambian storytelling, it shows us, it teaches us, how ordinary people like Grace, in extraordinary...

Frederick Douglass was a self-educated slave in the South who grew up to become an icon. He was a leader of the abolitionist movement, a celebrated writer, an esteemed speaker, and a social reformer, proving that, as he said, "Once you learn to read, you will be forever free."

The story of one of America's most revered figures is brought to life by the text of award-winning author Walter Dean Myers.

Laban Carrick Hill, the best-selling author of the National Book Award Finalist Harlem Stomp, here delivers an inspiring and lyrical story of a gifted craftsman who lived in South Carolina two centuries ago. Dave’s superb artistry and the deeply observant poetry he carved onto his pots reveal how he transcended the limitations he faced as a slave.

This is the true story of James Lafayette, a slave who spied for George Washington's army during the American Revolution. But while America celebrated its newfound freedom, James returned to slavery. His service hadn't qualified him for the release he'd been hoping for. For James, the fight wasn't over; he'd already helped his country gain its freedom, now it was time to win his own.

Everybody knows about the Founding Fathers and the Declaration of Independence in 1776. But the founders weren't the only ones who believed that everyone had a right to freedom. Mumbet, a Massachusetts slave, believed it too. She longed to be free, but how? Would anyone help her in her fight for freedom? Could she win against her owner, the richest man in town? Mumbet was determined to try.

A searing and tender novel about a young Black journalist’s search for answers in the unsolved murder of her great-grandfather in segregated Birmingham, Alabama, decades ago—inspired by the author’s own family history Birmingham, 1929: Robert Lee Harrington, a master carpenter, has just...

Newbery Medalist Christopher Paul Curtis brings his trademark humor and heart to the story of a boy struggling to do right in the face of history's cruelest evils. Twelve-year-old Charlie is down on his luck: His dad just died, the share crops are dry, and Cap'n Buck--the most fearsome man in...

WINNER OF THE CHIRBY FICTION AWARD From the co-editor of the bestselling anthology Never Whistle at Night, a semi-autobiographical novel that follows a group of teenage gang members as they trek across Chicago to a momentous meeting, inspired by the cult classic The Warriors “Cool and real...

When Cornelius Allen gives his daughter Clarissa’s hand in marriage, he presents her with a wedding gift: the young slave she grew up with, Sarah. Sarah is also Allen’s daughter and Clarissa’s sister, a product of his longtime relationship with his house slave, Emmeline. When Clarissa’s husband suspects that their newborn son is illegitimate, Clarissa and Sarah are sent back to her parents, Cornelius and Theodora, in shame, setting in motion a series of events that will destroy this once-powerful family.