Juneteenth Book Suggestions for Adults

Juneteenth commemorates an effective end of slavery in the United States. Juneteenth honors the end to slavery in the United States and is considered the longest-running African American holiday. On June 17, 2021, it officially became a federal holiday. Check out the books on this list to learn more about the history of Juneteenth and slavery in the United States.

Updated June 12, 2024
LINCC (Libraries in Clackamas County)Oregon City Public Library
Drag items up and down to your preferred order then select the "Save Order" button.
The 1619 Project : a new origin story
Hannah-Jones, Nikole
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * NAACP IMAGE AWARD WINNER * A dramatic expansion of a groundbreaking work of journalism, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story offers a profoundly revealing vision of the American past and present. "[A] groundbreaking compendium . . ....
African American poetry : 250 years of struggle & song
Young, Kevin
Paper Book
Taking the measure of the tradition in a single indispensable volume, African American Poetry: 250 Years of Struggle and Song sets a new standard for a genuinely deep engagement with Black poetry and its essential expression of American genius.
African founders : how enslaved people expanded American ideals
Fischer, David Hackett
Paper Book
In this sweeping, foundational work, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Hackett Fischer draws on extensive research to show how enslaved Africans and their descendants enlarged American ideas of freedom in varying ways in different regions of the early United States. ...
The agitators : three friends who fought for abolition and women's rights
Wickenden, Dorothy
Paper Book
An LA Times Best Book of the Year "Engrossing... examines the major events of the mid 19th century through the lives of three key figures in the abolitionist and women's rights movements." --Smithsonian From the executive editor of ...
The American queen : a novel
Miller, Vanessa
Paper Book
AS SEEN ON GOOD MORNING AMERICA: GMA 15 New Books to Read! 2024 American Fiction Award WINNER for African American Fiction AND Historical Fiction "Miller brings to enthralling life a hidden gem in American history." --Publishers Weekly There is only one known queen who...
Congress at war : how Republican reformers fought the Civil War, defied Lincoln, ended slavery, and remade America
Bordewich, Fergus M.
Paper Book
The story of how Congress helped win the Civil War--a new perspective that puts the House and Senate, rather than Lincoln, at the center of the conflict. This brilliantly argued new perspective on the Civil War overturns the popular conception that Abraham Lincoln single-handedly...
Driving the Green book : a road trip through the living history of Black resistance
Hall, Alvin D.
Paper Book
Join award-winning broadcaster Alvin Hall on a journey through America's haunted racial past, with the legendary Green Book as your guide. For countless Americans, the open road has long been a place where dangers lurk. In the era of Jim Crow, Black travelers experienced...
Educated for freedom : the incredible story of two fugitive schoolboys who grew up to change a nation
Duane, Anna Mae
Paper Book
The powerful story of two young men who changed the national debate about slavery In the 1820s, few Americans could imagine a viable future for black children. Even abolitionists saw just two options for African American youth: permanent subjection or exile. Educated for Freedom...
The fire next time
Baldwin, James
Audiobook
At once a powerful evocation of his early life in Harlem and a disturbing examination of the consequences of racial injustice to both the individual and the body politic, James Baldwin galvanized the nation in the early days of the civil rights movement with his eloquent manifesto. The Fire Next...
Four hundred souls : a community history of African America, 1619-2019
Kendi, Ibram X.
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A chorus of extraordinary voices tells the epic story of the four-hundred-year journey of African Americans from 1619 to the present--edited by Ibram X. Kendi, author of How to Be an Antiracist, and Keisha N. Blain, author of Set the World on...
Gateway to freedom : the hidden history of the underground railroad
Foner, Eric
Paper Book
More than any other scholar, Eric Foner has influenced our understanding of America's history. Now, making brilliant use of extraordinary evidence, the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian once again reconfigures the national saga of American slavery and freedom. A deeply entrenched...
The good lord bird
McBride, James
Paper Book
Henry Shackleford is a young slave living in the Kansas Territory in 1857, the region a battlefield between anti and pro slavery forces. When John Brown, the legendary abolitionist, arrives in the area, an arguement between Brown and Henry's master quickly turns violent. Henry is forced to leave...
Homegoing
Gyasi, Yaa
Paper Book
Winner of the NBCC's John Leonard First Book Prize A New York Times 2016 Notable Book One of Oprah's 10 Favorite Books of 2016 NPR's Debut Novel of the Year One of Buzzfeed's Best Fiction Books Of 2016 One of Time's Top 10 Novels of 2016
How the word is passed : a reckoning with the history of slavery across America
Smith, Clint
Paper Book
This "important and timely" (Drew Faust, Harvard Magazine) #1 New York Times bestseller examines the legacy of slavery in America--and how both history and memory continue to shape our everyday lives. Beginning in his hometown of New Orleans, Clint...
Juneteenth : a novel
Ellison, Ralph.
Paper Book
Shot on the Senate floor by a young Black man, a dying racist senator summons an elderly Black Baptist minister from Oklahoma to his side for a remarkable dialogue that reveals the deeply buried secrets of their shared past and the tragedy that reunites them.
The last slave ship : the true story of how Clotilda was found, her descendants, and an extraordinary reckoning
Raines, Ben
Paper Book
An NPR Best Book of the Year The incredible true story of the last ship to carry enslaved people to America, the remarkable town its survivors founded after emancipation, and the complicated legacy their descendants carry with them to this day--by the journalist who...
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,...
Lincoln and the abolitionists John Quincy Adams, Slavery, and the Civil War
Kaplan, Fred M.
Ebook
"Anyone who wants to understand the United States' racial divisions will learn a lot from reading Kaplan's richly researched account of one of the worst periods in American history and its chilling effects today in our cities, legislative bodies, schools, and houses of worship." --...
Master slave husband wife : an epic journey from slavery to freedom
Woo, Ilyon
Paper Book
Winner of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in Biography "A rich narrative of the Crafts, an enslaved couple who escaped from Georgia in 1848, with light-skinned Ellen disguised as a disabled white gentleman and William as her manservant, exploiting assumptions about race, class, and...
Never caught : the Washingtons' relentless pursuit of their runaway slave, Ona Judge
Dunbar, Erica Armstrong
Paper Book
Finalist for the National Book Award for Nonfiction "A fascinating and moving account of a courageous and resourceful woman. Beautifully written and utilizing previously untapped sources it sheds new light both on the father of our country and on the intersections of slavery and...
On Juneteenth
Gordon-Reed, Annette
Paper Book
Weaving together American history, dramatic family chronicle, and searing episodes of memoir, Annette Gordon-Reed's On Juneteenth provides a historian's view of the country's long road to Juneteenth, recounting both its origins in Texas and the enormous hardships that African-Americans have...
The president and the freedom fighter : Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, and their battle to save America's soul
Kilmeade, Brian
Paper Book
Brian Kilmeade tells the little-known story of how Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass moved from strong disagreement to friendship, uniting over their love for the Constitution and over their surprising commonalities. Both came from destitution. Both were self-educated and self-made men. Both...
The second founding : how the Civil War and Reconstruction remade the constitution
Foner, Eric
Paper Book
The Declaration of Independence announced equality as an American ideal, but it took the Civil War and the subsequent adoption of three constitutional amendments to establish that ideal as American law. The Reconstruction amendments abolished slavery, guaranteed all persons due process and equal...
Stony the road : Reconstruction, white supremacy, and the rise of Jim Crow
Gates, Henry Louis, Jr.
Paper Book
The abolition of slavery after the Civil War is a familiar story, as is the civil rights revolution that transformed the nation after World War II. But the century in between remains a mystery: if emancipation sparked 'a new birth of freedom' in Lincoln's America, why was it necessary to march in...
They were her property : white women as slave owners in the American South
Jones-Rogers, Stephanie E.
Audiobook
A bold and searing investigation into the role of white women in the American slave economy. Bridging women's history, the history of the South, and African American history, this book makes a bold argument about the role of white women in American slavery. Historian Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers draws...
Twelve years a slave : [narrative of Solomon Northup, a citizen of New York, kidnapped in Washington city in 1841, and rescued in 1853, from a cotton plantation near the Red River in Louisiana]
Northup, Solomon
Paper Book
Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup is a memoir of a black man who was born free in New York state but kidnapped, sold into slavery and kept in bondage for 12 years in Louisiana before the American Civil War. He provided details of slave markets in Washington, DC, as well as describing at length...
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...
The war before the war : fugitive slaves and the struggle for America's soul from the Revolution to the Civil War
Delbanco, Andrew
Paper Book
"Excellent...stunning."--Ta-Nehisi Coates The devastating story of how fugitive slaves drove the nation to Civil War A New York Times Notable Book Selection * Winner of the Mark Lynton History Prize* Winner of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award * A ...
Watermelon & red birds : a cookbook for Juneteenth and black celebrations
Taylor, Nicole A.
Paper Book
The very first cookbook to celebrate Juneteenth, from food writer and cookbook author Nicole A. Taylor--who draws on her decade of experiences observing the holiday. On June 19, 1865, more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, Major...
We were eight years in power : an American tragedy
Coates, Ta-Nehisi
Paper Book
In this "urgently relevant"* collection featuring the landmark essay "The Case for Reparations," the National Book Award-winning author of Between the World and Me "reflects on race, Barack Obama's presidency and its jarring aftermath"*--including the election of Donald...

Library staff! You can create and contribute to lists. Contact your catalog administrator or log in here.