Historical Fiction by Black or Indigenous Authors

Participating in Books & Bites Bingo? Here are some suggestions for the prompt, historical fiction by a Black or Indigenous author.

Updated August 19, 2024
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Can't we be friends : a novel of Ella Fitzgerald and Marilyn Monroe
Bryce, Denny S.
Ebook
Award-winning author Denny S. Bryce and USA Today bestselling author Eliza Knight collaborate on a brilliant novel that uncovers the boundary-breaking, genuine friendship between Ella Fitzgerald, the Queen of Jazz, and iconic movie star Marilyn Monroe.  One woman was recognized as the...
Even as we breathe : a novel
Clapsaddle, Annette Saunooke
Paper Book
Nineteen-year-old Cowney Sequoyah yearns to escape his hometown of Cherokee, North Carolina, in the heart of the Smoky Mountains. When a summer job at Asheville's luxurious Grove Park Inn and Resort brings him one step closer to escaping the hills that both cradle and suffocate him, he sees it as...
The mayor of Maxwell Street
Cunningham, Avery
Paper Book
"A debut novel everyone will be talking about," Avery Cunningham's epic love story is "a triumph" and "a tale of intrigue, racial tension, and class warfare, set against the glamorous and gritty backdrop of early 20th century Chicago." When a rich Black debutante enlists the...
Into the bright open : a Secret garden remix
Dimaline, Cherie
Paper Book
In the Remixed Classics series, authors from marginalized backgrounds reinterpret classic works through their own cultural lens to subvert the overwhelming cishet, white, and male canon. This queer YA reimagining of The Secret Garden subverts the cishet and white status quo of the...
The lost journals of Sacajewea : a novel
Earling, Debra Magpie
Paper Book
Winner of the Montana Book Award From the award-winning author of Perma Red comes a devastatingly beautiful novel that challenges prevailing historical narratives of Sacajewea. "In my seventh winter,...
The night watchman : a novel
Erdrich, Louise
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE 2021 PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER WASHINGTON POST, NPR, CBS SUNDAY MORNING, KIRKUS, CHICAGO PUBLIC LIBRARY, AND GOOD HOUSEKEEPING BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR Based on the extraordinary life of National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich's...
James : a novel
Everett, Percival
Paper Book
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE * KIRKUS PRIZE FINALIST * A brilliant, action-packed reimagining of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, both harrowing and darkly humorous, told from the enslaved Jim's point of view In development...
Coleman Hill : a novel
Foote, Kim Coleman
Ebook
Life and other love songs
Gray, Anissa
Paper Book
"Musical in structure--the octaves rise when the music calls for it; truths are revealed by the invisible beats of this gorgeous, rich story" -Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Hello Beautiful (Oprah's Book Club Pick) "Riveting, rhythmic, transcendent...
The house of Eve : a novel
Johnson, Sadeqa
Paper Book
"Amazing...I was completely surprised by the ending of this beautifully told and written book." --Reese Witherspoon "A triumph of historical fiction" (The Washington Post), an instant New York Times bestseller, and a Reese's Book Club pick, set in 1950s...
All we were promised : a novel
Lattimore, Ashton
Paper Book
A housemaid with a dangerous family secret conspires with a wealthy young abolitionist to help an enslaved girl escape, in volatile pre-Civil War Philadelphia--"a gripping novel about standing up to impossible odds" (People, Best New Books) The rebel . . . the...
The unsettled
Mathis, Ayana
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK * A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR *  From the best-selling author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, a searing multi-generational novel--set in the 1980s in racially and politically turbulent Philadelphia and in the tiny town of Bonaparte, Alabama--about...
The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store
McBride, James
Paper Book
THE RUNAWAY NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK * A NEW YORK TIMES READERS PICK: 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21ST CENTURY WINNER OF THE 2024 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PRIZE FOR AMERICAN FICTION FROM ONE OF TIME MAGAZINE'S...
Moonrise over New Jessup : a novel
Minnicks, Jamila
Paper Book
"With compelling characters and a heart-pounding plot, Jamila Minnicks pulled me into pages of history I'd never turned before."―Barbara Kingsolver, New York Times bestselling author of Demon Copperhead Winner of the PEN...
Double lives
Monroe, Mary
Ebook
Wandering stars
Orange, Tommy
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE * The Pulitzer Prize-finalist and author of the breakout bestseller There There ("Pure soaring beauty."The New York Times Book Review) delivers a masterful follow-up to his already classic first novel. Extending...
Ella : a novel
Richards, Diane
Ebook
In the vein of The Paris Wife and The Personal Librarian comes this debut novel, a magnificent work of "biographical fiction" that reimagines the turbulent and triumphant early years of Ella Fitzgerald, arguably the greatest singer of the twentieth century. When fifteen-year-old Ella...
The American daughters : a novel
Ruffin, Maurice Carlos
Paper Book
"An enthralling tale of a secret resistance movement run by Black women in pre-Civil War New Orleans."--Time "Stirring . . . In telling this important, neglected history with imagination-fueled research, The American Daughters offers an inspiring story of people...
Women of the post
Sanders, Joshunda
Ebook
  "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...
The queen of Sugar Hill : a novel of Hattie McDaniel
Tate, ReShonda
Paper Book
Bestselling author ReShonda Tate presents a fascinating fictional portrait of Hattie McDaniel, one of Hollywood's most prolific but woefully underappreciated stars--and the first Black person ever to win an Oscar for her role as Mammy in the critically acclaimed film classic Gone...
Cherokee America
Verble, Margaret
Ebook
This Spur Award-winning novel of the Cherokee Nation follows an epic saga of family alliances and culture clashes in the aftermath of the Civil War. Cherokee Nation West, 1875. It's early in spring, and a baby has gone missing--along with a preacher, a black hired hand,...
When Two Feathers fell from the sky
Verble, Margaret
Paper Book
Louise Erdrich meets Karen Russell in this deliciously strange and daringly original novel from Pulitzer Prize finalist Margaret Verble: set in 1926 Nashville, it follows a death-defying young Cherokee horse-diver who, with her companions from the Glendale Park Zoo, must get to the bottom of a...
Pemmican wars
Vermette, Katherena
Ebook
Let us descend : a novel
Ward, Jesmyn
Paper Book
OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK * Instant New York Times Bestseller * Named one of the best books of 2023 by The Washington Post, Vanity Fair, The Boston Globe, Time, The New Yorker, and more. "Nothing short of epic,...
Ours
Williams, Phillip B.
Paper Book
Chosen as a Most Anticipated Book of 2024 by Oprah's Book Club, Elle, Reader's Digest, The Rumpus, Kirkus Reviews, The Millions, Lit Hub, and more "An inventive ode to self-determination and also a surrealistic vision of Black life as...

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