- African American Fiction
- Picture Books
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Big Jabe by Jerdine Nolen . Momma Mary tells stories about a special young man who does wondrous things, especially for the slaves on the Plenty Plantation.
Daughter's Day Blues by Laura Pegram. Phyllis Mae thinks her little brother gets too much attention, so Nana and Momma decide to have a special Daughter's Day celebration.
Faraway Home by Jane Kurtz. Desta's father describes what it was like growing up in Ethiopia .
Flower Girl Butterflies by Elizabeth Fitzgerald Howard. Sarah is both excited and nervous about being the flower girl in her aunt's wedding.
Homemade Love by Bell Hooks. A girl who is Girlpie to her mama and Honey Bun Chocolate Dewdrop to her daddy savors the warmth and love of her family.
Hot City by Barbara Joosse. Mimi and her little brother Joe escape from home and the city's summer heat to read and dream about princesses and dinosaurs in the cool, quiet library.
Lookin' for Bird in the Big City by Robert Burleigh. A young Miles Davis looks for Charlie Parker in New York City .
Momma, Where Are You From? by Marie Bradby. Momma describes the special people and surroundings of her childhood, in a place where the edge of town met the countryside, in a time when all the children at school were brown.
My Feet are Laughing by Lissette Norman. Sadie, an imaginative young Dominican American, relates her experiences growing up in her grandmother's brownstone house in Harlem .
Precious and the Boo Hag by Patricia McKissack. Home alone with a stomachache while the family works in the fields, a young girl faces up to the horrifying Boo Hag that her brother warned her about.
Secret to Freedom by Marcia Vaughan. Great Aunt Lucy tells a story of her days as a slave, when she and her brother, Albert, learned the quilt code to help direct other slaves and, eventually, Albert himself, to freedom in the North.
Shining by Julius Lester. A young girl, who has not uttered a sound since birth, is shunned by the people in her village until they realize how special she is.
Sing Along Song by JoAnn Early Macken. A child sings along with the songs made by everyday sounds, from the chirping of a robin in the morning to the cooing of baby sister as she falls asleep in the evening.
Sweet Potato Pie by Kathleen D. Lindsey. During a drought in the early 1900s, a large loving African American family finds a delicious way to earn the money they need to save their family farm.
Uptown by Bryan Collier. A tour of the sights of Harlem , including the Metro-North Train, brownstones, shopping on 125th Street , a barber shop, summer basketball, the Boy's Choir, and sunset over the Harlem River .
Virgie Goes to School With Us Boys by Elizabeth Howard. In the post-Civil War South, a young girl is determined to go to school with her brothers.
Messy Bessey's Closet by Pat McKissack. Messy Bessey learns a lesson about sharing when she cleans out her closet.
Fiction
Abby Takes a Stand by Pat McKissack. Gee recalls for her grandchildren what happened in 1960 in Nashville , Tennessee , when she, aged ten, passed out flyers while her cousin and other adults held sit-ins at restaurants and lunch counters to protest segregation.
Abraham's Battle: a Novel of Gettysburg by Sara H. Banks. In 1863, as the Civil War approaches his home in Gettysburg and he realizes that a big battle is about to begin, a freed slave named Abraham decides to join the ambulance corps of the Union Army.
Addy's Wedding Quilt by Connie Porter. Though her parents "jumped the broom" to get married when they were slaves, now that they are living free in Philadelphia after the Civil War they plan to have a church wedding and Addy works to complete a special quilt to give them as a wedding gift.
Bravo, Grace! by Mary Hoffman. Story about Grace and her family and friends as she deals with modern issues of stepparents and boy-girl friendships.
Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis. Ten-year-old Bud escapes a bad foster home and goes out to search for the man he believes is his father.
David's Search by Joan Lowery Nixon. After eleven-year-old orphan-train rider David Howard settles with a strict Texas farm family, his best friend, an ex-slave, is threatened by the growing presence of the Ku-Klux Klan.
Drita: My Homegirl by Jenny Lombard. When ten-year-old Drita and her family, refugees from Kosovo, move to New York , Drita is teased about not speaking English well, but after a popular student named Maxie is forced to learn about Kosovo as a punishment for teasing Drita, the two girls soon bond.
Encore, Grace! by Mary Hoffman. Grace and her group of friends, the Famous Five, face a variety of changes, including a new girl in class, taking part in the Christmas play, losing a dear friend, and challenging the grown-ups in their lives.
Gloria Rising by Ann Cameron. A chance meeting with a woman astronaut encourages Gloria to try to be her best self, even with her difficult fourth-grade teacher, Mrs.Yardley.
Journal of Biddy Owens: the Negro Leagues by Walter Dean Myers. Teenager Biddy Owens keeps a journal in 1948 about the players on the Birmingham Black Barons.
Legend of Buddy Bush by Shelia P. Moses. In 1947, twelve-year-old Pattie Mae is sustained by her dreams of escaping Rich Square, North Carolina , and moving to Harlem when her Uncle Buddy is arrest for attempted rape of a white woman and her grandfather is diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor.
Miami Makes the Play by Pat McKissack. Miami 's enjoyment of summer baseball camp is threatened by an antagonistic fellow camper.
Missy Violet & Me by Barbara Hathaway. During the early 1900s, eleven-year-old Viney spends her summer working for the local midwife and learns firsthand about birth, death, and "catchin' babies."
Mr. Chickee's Funny Money by Christopher Paul Curtis. Flint Future Detective Club members Steven Carter, his friend Russell, and Russell's huge dog Zoopy solve the mystery of a quadrillion-dollar bill with the image of James Brown on it.
Old African by Julius Lester. An elderly slave uses the power of his mind to ease the suffering of his fellow slaves and eventually lead them back to Africa. Based on an actual incident from black history.
Once On This River by Sharon Dennis Wyeth. While on a trip with her mother from Madagascar to New York in 1760, eleven-year-old Monday learns the horrors of slavery and the truth about her "other" mother.
Rosetta, Rosetta, Sit By Me! by Linda Walvoord. In 1848, Rosetta, the nine-year-old daughter of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, becomes the only Black student at Miss Tracy's Female Seminary in Rochester, New York, and while the students are pleased she is there, the faculty is not.
Silent Thunder: a Civil War Story by Andrea Davis Pinkney. In 1862 eleven-year-old Summer and her thirteen-year-old brother Rosco take turns describing how life on the quiet Virginia plantation where they are slaves is affected by the Civil War.
Storm Warriors by Elisa Carbone. In 1895, Nathan moves to an island off North Carolina and hopes to join the all-black crew at a nearby lifesaving station.
Watsons Go To Birmingham - 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis. The Watsons' lives change after they visit Grandma in Alabama in 1963.
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