African American

Publisher's Summary The first science-fiction written by a black woman, Kindred has become a cornerstone of African-American literature. This combination of slave memoir, fantasy, and historical fiction is a novel of rich literary complexity. Having just celebrated her 26th birthday in 1976 California, Dana, an African-American woman, is suddenly and inexplicably wrenched through time into antebellum Maryland. After saving a drowning white boy there, she finds herself staring into the barrel of a shotgun and is transported back to the present just in time to save her life. During numerous such time-defying episodes with the same young man, she realizes the challenge she's been given: to protect this young slaveholder until he can father her own great-grandmother. Author Octavia E. Butler skilfully juxtaposes the serious issues of slavery, human rights, and racial prejudice with an exciting science-fiction, romance, and historical adventure. Kim Staunton's narrative talent magically transforms the listener's earphones into an audio time machine. ©2000 Octavia Butler (P)2000 Recorded Books, LLC

Publisher's Summary "Mosley writes with great power here about themes that have permeated his work: institutional racism, political corruption, and the ways that both of these issues affect not only society at large but also the inner lives of individual men and women." ( Booklist , starred review) Joe King Oliver was one of the NYPD's finest investigators, until, dispatched to arrest a well-heeled car thief, he is framed for assault by his enemies within the NYPD, a charge which lands him in solitary at Rikers Island. A decade later, King is a private detective, running his agency with the help of his teenage daughter, Aja-Denise. Broken by the brutality he suffered and committed in equal measure while behind bars, his work and his daughter are the only light in his solitary life. When he receives a card in the mail from the woman who admits she was paid to frame him those years ago, King realizes that he has no choice but to take his own case: figuring out who on the force wanted him disposed of - and why. Running in parallel with King's own quest for justice is the case of a Black radical journalist accused of killing two on-duty police officers who had been abusing their badges to traffic in drugs and women within the city's poorest neighborhoods. Joined by Melquarth Frost, a brilliant sociopath, our hero must beat dirty cops and dirtier bankers, craven lawyers, and above all keep his daughter far from the underworld in which he works. All the while, two lives hang in the balance: King's client's, and King's own. ©2018 Walter Mosley (P)2018 Hachette Audio

Publisher's Summary Just after devastating riots tear through Los Angeles in 1965, when anger is high and fear still smolders everywhere, the police turn up at Easy Rawlins' doorstep. He expects the worst, as usual. But they've come to ask for his help. A man was wrenched from his car by a mob at the riots' peak and escaped into a nearby apartment building. Soon afterward, a redheaded woman known as Little Scarlet was found dead in that building, and the fleeing man is the obvious suspect. But the man has vanished. The police fear that their presence in certain neighborhoods could spark a new inferno, so they ask Easy Rawlins to see what he can discover. The vanished man is the key, but he is only the beginning. Easy enlists the help of his longtime friend Mouse to break through the shroud. And what Easy finds is a killer whose rage, like that which burned in the city for weeks, is intrinsically woven around deep-set passions, feelings echoed within Easy himself. Rawlins's hunt for the killer reveals a new city emerging from the ashes, with the promise of a new life for Easy, Mouse, and his old friends Jackson Blue and Jewelle. Mosley's lean and musical vernacular captures the heat and the rhythm of Los Angeles' heart, where danger is the common currency of everyday life. Little Scarlet is further proof that Mosley is "a master of mystery" ( New York Times Book Review ). Hear more of Walter Mosley's Easy Rawlins mysteries. And listen to a conversation with Walter Mosley . ©2004 Walter Mosley (P)2004 Time Warner AudioBooks

Publisher's Summary In Black Water Rising, Attica Locke delivered one of the most stunning and sure-handed fiction debuts in recent memory, garnering effusive critical praise, several award nominations, and passionate reader response. Now Locke returns with The Cutting Season, a riveting thriller that intertwines two murders separated across more than a century. Caren Gray manages Belle Vie, a sprawling antebellum plantation that sits between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, where the past and the present coexist uneasily. The estate's owners have turned the place into an eerie tourist attraction, complete with full-dress re-enactments and carefully restored slave quarters. Outside the gates, a corporation with ambitious plans has been busy snapping up land from struggling families who have been growing sugar cane for generations, and now replacing local employees with illegal laborers. Tensions mount when the body of a female migrant worker is found in a shallow grave on the edge of the property, her throat cut clean. As the investigation gets under way, the list of suspects grows. But when fresh evidence comes to light and the sheriff's department zeros in on a person of interest, Caren has a bad feeling that the police are chasing the wrong leads. Putting herself at risk, she ventures into dangerous territory as she unearths startling new facts about a very old mystery - the long-ago disappearance of a former slave - that has unsettling ties to the current murder. In pursuit of the truth about Belle Vie's history and her own, Caren discovers secrets about both cases - ones that an increasingly desperate killer will stop at nothing to keep buried. Taut, hauntingly resonant, and beautifully written, The Cutting Season is at once a thoughtful meditation on how America reckons its past with its future, and a high-octane pause resister that unfolds with tremendous skill and vision. With her rare gift for depicting human nature in all its complexities, Attica Locke demonst

Publisher's Summary When Walter Mosley burst onto the literary scene in 1990 with his first Easy Rawlins mystery, Devil in a Blue Dress - a combustible mixture of Raymond Chandler and Richard Wright - he captured the attention of hundreds of thousands of readers (including future president Bill Clinton). Eleven books later, Easy Rawlins is one of the few private eyes in contemporary crime fiction who can be called iconic and immortal. In the incendiary and fast-paced Little Green, he returns from the brink of death to investigate the dark side of L.A.’s 1960s hippie haven, the Sunset Strip. We last saw Easy in 2007’s Blonde Faith, fighting for his life after his car plunges over a cliff. True to form, the tough WWII veteran survives, and soon his murderous sidekick Mouse has him back cruising the mean streets of L.A., in all their psychedelic 1967 glory, to look for a young black man, Evander "Little Green" Noon, who disappeared during an acid trip. Fueled by an elixir called Gator’s Blood, brewed by the conjure woman Mama Jo, Easy experiences a physical, spiritual, and emotional resurrection, but peace and love soon give way to murder and mayhem. Written with Mosley’s signature grit and panache, this engrossing and atmospheric mystery is not only a trip back in time, it is also a tough-minded exploration of good and evil, and of the power of guilt and redemption. Once again, Easy asserts his reign over the City of (Fallen) Angels. ©2013 Walter Mosley (P)2013 Random House Audio

WHEN DANGER ARRIVES, REAL MEN TAKE ACTION Dakota (Dak) Navarro, wealthy entrepreneur, international playboy and jet-setter, arrives in Miami for the wedding of his friend, Andrew Logan. He is hoping to see Dr. Amelia Courson, the woman he met two years earlier at another wedding – that of his good friend and her brother, Stonewall Courson. Dr. Amelia Courson is a doctor who feels that lately she is taking care of everyone but herself. She is long overdue for a vacation and wants to let go and get wild. She has heard about Dak’s “love-them-and-leave-them”, “no-strings-attached” attitude, and since she is not looking for love either, Amelia feels Dak is just what this doctor orders. Dak is a man of action and is ready to whisk Amelia away on his private jet to an exotic location…for R, R and R – rest, relaxation and rolling between the sheets. What Dak does not count on is keeping them both alive when danger comes knocking at their door.

Publisher's Summary A prequel to Ashley and JaQuavis' New York Times best-selling Cartel series, this story follows the rise of notorious gangster Carter Diamond, taking listeners through his days on the mean streets of Michigan to his becoming the biggest drug lord Miami has ever seen. Before the cartel was ever created, he stood alone. ©2015 Brookgate Publishing (P)2015 Blackstone Publishing, and Urban Audiobooks

The Earth barely survived the Third World War. It isn’t ready for the War of the Worlds. A beam of pure Chaos has descended on the Earth connecting it to the Labyrinth Universe. Monsters will spawn, heroes will level and nations will fall. Chaos will Awaken! From the mind of Aleron Kong, the Father of American LitRPG, comes his tenth book! With over 1,000,000 books sold, a Wall Street Journal Best Seller and the series voted one of the Top 100 of ALL TIME by Audible.com, you can’t go wrong! Experience a brand new magical system combining LitRPG leveling and Wuxia cultivation in a seamless world that always pushes the characters you love and hate to the edges of the universe and their sanity. Not everyone will survive when Chaos Awakens!

The Earth barely survived the Third World War. It isn’t ready for the War of the Worlds. A beam of pure Chaos has descended on the Earth connecting it to the Labyrinth Universe. Monsters will spawn, heroes will level and nations will fall. Chaos will Awaken! From the mind of Aleron Kong, the Father of American LitRPG, comes his tenth book! With over 1,000,000 books sold, a Wall Street Journal Best Seller and the series voted one of the Top 100 of ALL TIME by Audible.com, you can’t go wrong! Experience a brand new magical system combining LitRPG leveling and Wuxia cultivation in a seamless world that always pushes the characters you love and hate to the edges of the universe and their sanity. Not everyone will survive when Chaos Awakens!

The Earth barely survived the Third World War. It isn’t ready for the War of the Worlds. A beam of pure Chaos has descended on the Earth connecting it to the Labyrinth Universe. Monsters will spawn, heroes will level and nations will fall. Chaos will Awaken! From the mind of Aleron Kong, the Father of American LitRPG, comes his tenth book! With over 1,000,000 books sold, a Wall Street Journal Best Seller and the series voted one of the Top 100 of ALL TIME by Audible.com, you can’t go wrong! Experience a brand new magical system combining LitRPG leveling and Wuxia cultivation in a seamless world that always pushes the characters you love and hate to the edges of the universe and their sanity. Not everyone will survive when Chaos Awakens!