Staff Picks: Black History Month 2025

Updated February 4, 2026
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JAMES. NO US RIGHTS
Everett, Percival.
Paper Book
'Truly extraordinary books are rare, and this is one of them' - Roddy Doyle James is a profound and ferociously funny novel from one of our greatest living writers, Percival Everett. The Sunday Times Bestseller Winner of the...
Sing, unburied, sing
Ward, Jesmyn
Paper Book
_______________ SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2018 WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD 2017 ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S BEST BOOKS OF 2017 SELECTED AS A BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW STATESMAN...
Just mercy :
Stevenson, Bryan,
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING MICHAEL B. JORDAN AND JAMIE FOXX * A powerful true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to fix our broken system of justice--from one of the most brilliant and influential lawyers of our time...
Parable of the sower
Butler, Octavia E.
Paper Book
From a celebrated, award-winning author, a modern classic about a young girl fighting for survival in a post-apocalyptic world, perfect for fans of N.K. Jemisin and Margaret Atwood. Fifteen-year-old Lauren Olamina lives inside a gated community with her preacher father, family, and...
The nickel boys : a novel
Whitehead, Colson
Paper Book
PULITZER PRIZE WINNER * NATIONAL BESTSELLER * This follow-up to The Underground Railroad brilliantly dramatizes another strand of American history through the story of two boys unjustly sentenced to a hellish reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida. * "One of the most gifted novelists in...
Passing
Larsen, Nella.
Paper Book
Nella Larsen (1891-1964) occupies a central place in African-American and Modernist literature, and her status as a Harlem Renaissance woman writer is rivaled only by Zora Neale Hurston's. This Norton Critical Edition of Larsen's electrifying 1929 novel is accompanied by Carla Kaplan's insightfully...
New kid
Craft, Jerry
Paper Book
Winner of the Newbery Medal, Coretta Scott King Author Award, and Kirkus Prize for Young Readers' Literature!  Perfect for fans of Raina Telgemeier and Gene Luen Yang, New Kid is a timely, honest graphic novel about starting over at a new school where diversity is low...
Kindred
Butler, Octavia E.
Paper Book
From the New York Times bestselling author of Parable of the Sower and MacArthur "Genius" Grant, Nebula, and Hugo award winner The visionary time-travel classic whose Black female hero is pulled through time to face the horrors of American slavery and explores the...
Beloved : a novel
Morrison, Toni.
Paper Book
Toni Morrison--author of Song of Solomon and Tar Baby--is a writer of remarkable powers: her novels, brilliantly acclaimed for their passion, their dazzling language and their lyric and emotional force, combine the unassailable truths of experience and emotion with the vision of legend...
The bluest eye
Morrison, Toni.
Paper Book
The Bluest Eye,published in 1970, is the first novel written by Toni Morrison, winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize in Literature. It is the story of eleven-year-old Pecola Breedlove--a black girl in an America whose love for its blond, blue-eyed children can devastate all others--who prays for her eyes...
Washington Black /
Edugyan, Esi,
Paper Book
ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW'S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR * MAN BOOKER PRIZE FINALIST * "A gripping historical narrative exploring both the bounds of slavery and what it means to be truly free." --Vanity Fair Eleven-year-old George Washington...
The color purple : a novel
Walker, Alice
Paper Book
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, Alice Walker's iconic modern classic, now in a beautiful 40th anniversary Penguin Vitae edition with a foreword by Kiese LaymonA Penguin Classic Hardcover A powerful cultural touchstone of modern American literature, The...
The shadow king : a novel
Mengiste, Maaza
Paper Book
A beautifully written and utterly captivating novel about female strength and the power of belief, set during Mussolini's 1935 invasion of Ethiopia, The Shadow King casts a light on the women soldiers who were written out of history.
The vanishing half
Bennett, Brit
Paper Book
The undefeated /
Alexander, Kwame.
Paper Book
Winner of the 2020 Caldecott Medal A 2020 Newbery Honor Book Winner of the 2020 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award The Newbery Award-winning author of THE CROSSOVER pens an ode to black American triumph and tribulation, with art from a two-time...
Blues journey /
Myers, Walter Dean,
Paper Book
The blues aren't all sad. There's joy in the blues as well as heartbreak. Love discovered. Love lost. Love just around the corner. In this beautiful tribute to the poetry and art of the blues, renowned author Walter Dean Myers collaborates with his son, award-winning illustrator...
The underground railroad : a novel
Whitehead, Colson
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * PULITZER PRIZE WINNER * NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER * "An American masterpiece" (NPR) that chronicles a young slave's adventures as she makes a desperate bid for freedom in the antebellum South. One of The New York Times's 10 Best Books of...
Transcendent kingdom
Gyasi, Yaa
Paper Book
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2021 **From the bestselling author of Homegoing** 'A BOOK OF BLAZING BRILLIANCE' Washington Post ______________________________________________ As a child Gifty would ask...
Caste : the origins of our discontents
Wilkerson, Isabel
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * NEW YORK TIMES READERS PICK: 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21st CENTURY * OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK * ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR "An instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American...
The warmth of other suns : the epic story of America's great migration
Wilkerson, Isabel
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER * ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR * TIME'S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE * ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES'S FIVE BEST BOOKS OF THE 21ST CENTURY * A KIRKUS REVIEWS BEST...
Piecing me together
Watson, Renée
Paper Book
Newbery Honor and Coretta Scott King Author Award Winner New York Times bestseller "Timely and timeless." -Jacqueline Woodson "Important and deeply moving." -John Green Bestselling and award-winning author Renée Watson offers a powerful...
Long way down
Reynolds, Jason
Paper Book
A Newbery Honor Book A Coretta Scott King Honor Book A Printz Honor Book A Time Best YA Book of All Time (2021) A Los Angeles Times Book Prize Winner for Young Adult Literature Longlisted for the National...
The crossover /
Alexander, Kwame.
Paper Book
Series streaming now on Disney+, with executive producers including NBA great LeBron James! The Newbery Medal and Coretta Scott King Award-winning middle grade bestseller! Basketball and heartache share the court in this slam-dunk novel in verse. "With a bolt of lightning on my...

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