African American Library

In this anthology, everybody is Black. Filled with epic battles, complicated families, soft kisses, and sharpened blades, Magic in the Melanin is an adult fantasy anthology that showcases Black authors who write magical stories of all kinds.

Professor Hakim Adi draws on a variety of published works in Black Voices on Britain, all of which describe powerful experiences: James Gronniosaw and his family endure poverty, illness and unemployment; Mary Prince is driven out by her cruel owners and turns to London charities for help; Frederick Douglass, on a lecture tour around Britain, reveals how the Christian clergy built churches with slave-owners’ money and William Wells Brown gives his impressions of England as he travels around a country which welcomes him more readily than America.

Inspired by the #1 New York Times bestseller She Persisted by Chelsea Clinton and Alexandra Boiger comes a chapter book series about women who stood up, spoke up and rose up against the odds! Born enslaved, Harriet Tubman rose up to become one of the most successful, determined and well-known...

From award-winning author Tonya Bolden comes a biography of the first Black woman elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and the first Black woman to run for president with a major political party: Shirley Chisholm. Before there was Barack Obama, before there was Kamala Harris, there was...

Based on the viral poem, braids of all lengths, looks, parts, and styles are explored and cheered on in this vibrant audiobook celebrating the versatility of Black hair. Join author Jaylene Clark Owens as she pens an ode to Black girls and braids, a dynamic duo. This empowering audiobook shines...

The foremost diverse children's authors and illustrators - including Jason Reynolds, Jacqueline Woodson, and Kwame Alexander - share answers to the question, "In this divisive world, what shall we tell our children?" in this powerful collection, published in partnership with Just Us Books.

NICK FURY AND S.H.I.E.L.D. are faced with a foe no single person can defeat. So Fury sets out to bring together Earth's Mightiest Heroes and form the Avengers! Join Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, the Hulk, Black Widow, and Hawkeye as they battle the Asgardian trickster known as Loki, who plans...

A Coretta Scott King Honor Book A Boston Globe–Horn Book Poetry Award Winner An “imaginative and moving” (The Horn Book, starred review) portrait of a Black family tree shaped by enslavement and freedom, rendered in searing poems by ALSC Children’s Literature Legacy Award winner Carole...

LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD A powerful, genre-bending mosaic of fiction and poetry that celebrates the humanity, grace, and resilience of teenage New Yorkers riding out the pandemic—from the award-winning author of Chlorine Sky “A gorgeous, tender testament to the generation...

Coretta Scott King Honor winner Brenda Woods’s poignant, heartfelt story of an adopted boy and the bird he rescues Everyone expects Coop to be musical like his beloved parents, but he’s not. That’s one of the few things he finds awkward about being adopted—well, that and the fact that he...

A ten-day suspension has tweens De'Kari and Ebony seeing the world with a fresh perspective. Don't miss this poignant novel in verse from the award-winning author of Isaiah Dunn Is My Hero. Two kids. One fight. No one thinks they’re wrong. Flow I don’t even hit girls . . . is what I’m...

An adaptation of the powerful New York Times bestselling account of growing up Black and female in America, completely rewritten with new stories for young readers Austin Channing Brown’s first encounter with race in America came at age seven, when she discovered that her parents had named her...

The powerful story of an eleven-year-old Black boy determined to stand up for his rights, who's pulled into the action of the 1963 civil rights demonstrations in Birmingham, Alabama. Rufus Jackson Jones is from Birmingham, the place Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called the most segregated place in...

A poignant story about the difficulties of leaving everything behind and the friendships that help you get through it. Fleeing war-torn Kosovo, ten-year-old Drita and her family move to America with the dream of living a typical American life. But with this hope comes the struggle to adapt and...

A young girl finds her voice—and discovers the power of speaking up for herself and her community—in this sweet and humorous chapter book by award-winning and #1 bestselling author Kwame Alexander, perfect for fans of Ivy + Bean and Ruby and the Booker Boys. When Macy gets book one of The...

A heart-rending novel-in-verse about a girl beginning to learn it is possible to go on even after a great loss. Eleven-year-old April Jackson loves playing the drums, almost as much as she loves her best friend, Zee, a violin prodigy. They both dream of becoming professional musicians one day...

Millions of Africans were enslaved during the transatlantic slave trade, but few recorded their personal experiences. Olaudah Equiano's The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano is perhaps the most well known of the autobiographies that exist. Using this narrative as a primary...

Printz Award winner Walter Dean Myers deftly draws a compassionate portrait of a boy's odyssey of self-discovery and the acceptance and empathy for others he learns along the way. David doesn't know what to make of his father, Reuben. His older brother, Tyrone, says Reuben is crazy. But Tyrone...

The second installment in a hilarious and charming chapter book series featuring exuberant and irresistible third-grader Millie Magnus. When Millie Magnus hears hints of a plan to tear down the neighborhood playground, she knows she and her friends absolutely can’t let that happen. Millie...

A Finalist for the National Book Award When Ada leaves home for her freshman year at a Historically Black College, it’s the first time she’s ever been so far from her family—and the first time that she’s been able to make her own choices and to seek her place in this new world. As she...