Biography

"In many ways writing saved my life. It's my hope that sharing my experience will give hope to others who are learning to deal with their "difference." I want them to know they don't have to live their lives in a permanent "don't ask, don't tell"...

Twelve Years a Slave, a chronicle of the amazing ordeal of a free African-American kidnapped in the north, and impressed into slavery in Louisiana, is one of the most compelling and detailed slave narratives in existence. The text and story were...

A book about racism and resilience in sport. Track cyclist Maurice Burton rose above the racism in British society and sport to triumph. He is a national sporting legend and role model, waiting to be discovered. On a still summer's evening at Leicester's...

From one of the greatest writers of the modern era, an intimate and essential collection of personal essays on home, identity, and colonialism Chinua Achebe's characteristically eloquent and nuanced voice is everywhere present in these seventeen...

"Lots of people have dreams, but C. Vivian Stringer is the dream--a coalminer's daughter who believed when her Poppa told her there was no obstacle she could not surmount. And she lives that dream, teaching others to rise up to meet challenges, turning...

Narrative of Sojourner Truth is one of the most important documents of slavery ever written, as well as being a partial autobiography of the woman who became a pioneer in the struggles for racial and sexual equality. With an eloquence that resonates more...

Jamaica Kincaid invites us into her garden in this "irresistible stream of horticultural consciousness" (Michael Pollan). Jamaica Kincaid's first garden in Vermont was a square plot in the middle of her front lawn. There, to the consternation of more...

Finalist for the 1997 National Book Award for NonfictionJamaica Kincaid's brother Devon Drew died of AIDS on January 19, 1996, at the age of thirty-three. Kincaid's incantatory, poetic, and often shockingly frank recounting of her brother's life and...

"Don't play in the sun. You're going to have to get a light-skinned husband for the sake of your children as it is." In these words from her mother, novelist and memoirist Marita Golden learned as a girl that she was the wrong color. Her mother had...

Autobiography of a People is an insightfully assembled anthology of eyewitness accounts that traces the history of the African American experience. From the Middle Passage to the Million Man March, editor Herb Boyd has culled a diverse range of voices,...

One woman's story, every woman's nightmareDonna Marie Hayes had a fortitude and smarts. She already survived so much. In this gripping memoir, Hayes recounts the story of her impoverished Jamaican childhood and eventual immigration to the United States...

The inspiring story of a Black doctor deeply affected by the violence in his childhood that plagued his Brooklyn community who was determined to be a force for change and dedicated himself to addressing trauma and violence as public health issues Rob...