African American Historical Fiction

After Winna's little sister breaks her glasses, her grandfather gives her an old-timey pair of spectacles that belonged to her great-aunt Estelle. The specs are silver and perfectly circular, with tiny stars on the bridge and earpieces that curl all the way around her ears. Best of all, they're magic. Because when Winna makes a wish beginning with the words "What if"—that is, when she speculates—the spectacles grant it.

Birmingham, 1929: Robert Lee Harrington, a master carpenter, has just moved to Alabama to pursue a job opportunity, bringing along his pregnant wife and young daughter. Birmingham is in its heyday, while Robert and his family find much to enjoy in the city, it’s also a stronghold for the Klan. 2019: Meghan McKenzie, a young reporter, has grown up hearing family lore about her great-grandfather’s murder—but no one knows the full story. Determined to find answers, Meghan travels to Birmingham. But as her investigation begins to uncover dark secrets, her life may be in danger.

In New York City, Joanna Marshall is an aspiring singer obsessed with success, determined to overcome the racism and sexism that stand in her way. Her childhood friends Maggie Ellersley and Peter Bye confront similar barriers but with different goals in mind: Maggie is focused on finding love; Peter, on becoming a surgeon. But as their interests overlap and their ambitions collide, the course of Joanna and Maggie’s lives seems destined to change forever. Written in response to the dominant stereotypes of the time, There Is Confusion paints a revelatory portrait....

Inspired by a real-life scandal that was shocking even for the tumultuous Roaring Twenties, this captivating novel tells the story of a secret marriage by a New York elite that ignites an explosive battle over race and class—and three very different women struggling for truth, legitimacy, and the futures they risked everything to shape.

Let the people of West Mills say what they will about Azalea 'Knot' Centre; they won't keep her from what she loves best: cheap moonshine, 19th-century literature, and the company of men. And yet, when motherhood looms, Knot begins to learn that her freedom has come at a high price. Low on money, ostracized from her parents and cut off from her hometown, Knot turns to her neighbor, Otis Lee Loving, in search of some semblance of family and home.

Cassandra, grandniece to Woodson and Ivy Lisle, is a college student caught up in the highly charged atmosphere of the days following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. When the granddaughter of Woodson and Ivy's friends goes missing, Cassandra is sucked into a dangerous mystery that threatens to expose long-buried secrets and jeopardize the life of anyone who asks too many questions.

In 1945, Charlie Trammell steps off a cross-country train into the vibrant tapestry of Los Angeles. Lured by his cousin Marguerite’s invitation to the esteemed West Adams Heights, Charlie is immediately captivated by the Black opulence of L.A.’s newly rechristened “Sugar Hill.” Settling in at a local actress’s energetic boarding house, Charlie discovers a different way of life—one brimming with opportunity—from a promising career at a Black-owned insurance firm, the absence of Jim Crow, to the potential of an unforgettable romance. But nothing dazzles quite like James “Reaper” Mann.

Sisters Margaret and Evelyn Justice have grown up in the prosperous Greenwood District of Tulsa, Oklahoma—also known as Black Wall Street. In Greenwood, the Justice sisters had it all—movie theaters and entertainment venues, beauty shops and clothing stores, high-profile businesses like law offices, medical clinics, and banks. While Evelyn aspires to head off to the East Coast to study fashion design, recent college grad Margaret plans to settle in Greenwood, teaching at the local high school and eventually raising a family.

Ordinary lovers, Dena Miller and Will Wallace, confront extraordinary obstacles in their romance. Classism in their native North Carolina threatens to end their nascent romance as it began. Then, larger and more ominous life-threatening challenges of white supremacy and World War II wreak havoc on the dreams of the young couple, forcing them apart.

Twelve-year-old Ann Maria Weems works from sunup to sundown, wraps rags around her feet in the winter, and must do whatever her master or mistress orders—but she has something that many plantation slaves don't have. She has her wonderful family around her. To Ann, her teasing brothers, her older sister, and her protective and loving parents are everything. And then one day, they are gone. Separated from her family by her master and shipped off as a housemaid, Ann learns something about independence and about love before the opportunity for escape arrives.

In the fall of 1959, Freda Gilroy arrives on the campus of Fisk University full of hope, carrying a suitcase and the voice of her father telling her she’s part of a family legacy of greatness. Soon, the ugliness of the Jim Crow South intrudes, and she’s thrust into a movement for social change. Freda is reluctant to get involved, torn between a soon-to-be doctor her parents approve of and an audacious young man willing to risk it all in the name of justice.

In 1919, a high school teacher from Washington, D.C arrives in Harlem excited to realize her lifelong dream. Jessie Redmon Fauset has been named the literary editor of The Crisis. The first Black woman to hold this position at a preeminent Negro magazine, Jessie is poised to achieve literary greatness. But she holds a secret that jeopardizes it all.

Set against the backdrop of the antebellum South, this compelling work of historical fiction follows the harrowing journey of a young man, stolen from his family and thrust into the merciless world of slavery. The story unfolds with the abduction of IDI, a bright and resourceful young man who is cruelly torn from his family and homeland. His journey takes him to the American South, where he is subjected to the dehumanizing horrors of servitude. Driven by an unshakable determination to regain his freedom, David befriends a group of fellow slaves who share his longing for escape.

In 1943, when a frail old white woman shows up in Red Clay, Alabama, at the home of a Black former slave—on the morning following his funeral—his family hardly knows what to expect after she utters the words “… a lifetime ago, my family owned yours.” Adelaide Parker has a story to tell—one of ambition, betrayal, violence, and redemption—that shaped both the fate of her family and that of the late Felix H. Parker. But there are gaps in her knowledge, and she’s come to Red Clay seeking answers from a family with whom she shares a name and a history that neither knows in full.

Sixteen years old and enslaved since she was born, Junie has spent her life on Bellereine Plantation in Alabama, cooking and cleaning alongside her family, and tending to the white master’s daughter, Violet. Her daydreams are filled with poetry and faraway worlds, while she spends her nights secretly roaming through the forest, consumed with grief over the sudden death of her older sister, Minnie. When wealthy guests arrive from New Orleans, hinting at marriage for Violet and upending Junie’s life, she commits a desperate act.

In the small college town of Troy, Alabama, amidst the backdrop of 1967, Katia Daniels lives a life steeped in responsibility. At the Pike County Group Home for Negro Boys, she pours her heart into nurturing the young lives under her care, harboring a longing for children of her own. Katia's romantic entanglement with an older man brings comfort but also stirs questions about the path she's chosen.

In this singular collection, John Edgar Wideman, the acclaimed author of Writing to Save a Life, blends the personal, historical, and political to invent complex, charged stories about love, death, struggle, and what we owe each other. With characters ranging from everyday Americans to Jean-Michel Basquiat to Nat Turner, American Histories is a journey through time, experience, and the soul of our country. Navigating an extraordinary range, Wideman challenges the boundaries of traditional forms, and delivers unforgettable, narratives that touch the core of what it means to be alive.

Au milieu des années 1960, Grace, jeune fille noire exilée du Sud ségrégationniste vers un New York en pleine lutte pour les droits civiques, tombe enceinte en même temps qu'elle découvre l'amour. On ne lui permet pas de garder l'enfant. C'est Delores, une femme traumatisée dans sa chair et dans son âme, qui va adopter et élever sa fille, Rae, en tentant de la préserver du poids de ses souvenirs. Mais à l'heure de devenir mère à son tour, Rae devra affronter cet héritage et faire la paix avec sa famille adoptive aussi bien qu'avec l'inconnue qui l'a mise au monde.

Told from the perspectives of statesman and orator Frederick Douglass, and journalist and activist Ida B. Wells, Before 13th is a story that illuminates the contradictions of freedom. Friends and rivals, Douglass and Wells clashed over how to grapple with the racism and exoticism that defined portrayals of African Americans at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, where Douglass was invited to speak after they had initially agreed to boycott the event. It uses the story of this real-life conflict as a lens through which we see the history of slavery and incarceration as never before.

Billed as the Little Girl with the Big Voice, blues singer Lucille Arnetta Love always dreamed of life under the lights. From traveling family gospel band to lead singer in a riotous vaudeville troupe, Lucille is on the rise. But a devastating family secret, one that’s poised to shatter every dream she’s ever had, casts an inescapable shadow over Lucille’s career. Decades ago, a botched robbery ended in a suspicious death—and all signs point to Lucille’s own father as the culprit. It’s a secret that Lucille’s family is determined to keep buried—even from Lucille herself.