Black Voices 2023

Ties That Tether

By: Jane Igharo
Narrated by: Nkeki Obi-Melekwe & Gary Tiedemann
Length: 9 hours 13 minutes

One of Betches' 7 Books by Black Authors You Need to Read This Summer

One of Elite Daily’s Books Featuring Interracial Relationships You Should Read In 2020
 
One of Marie Claire’s 2020 Books You Should Add to Your Reading List

When a Nigerian woman falls for a man she knows will break her mother’s heart, she must choose between love and her... Read more

Shame on Me

An Anatomy of Race and Belonging

By: Tessa McWatt
Narrated by: Tessa McWatt
Length: 5 hours 48 minutes

FINALIST FOR THE GOVERNOR GENERAL'S AWARD FOR NON-FICTION
 
Interrogating our ideas of race through the lens of her own multi-racial identity, critically acclaimed novelist Tessa McWatt turns her eye on herself, her body and this world in a powerful new work of non-fiction.

Tessa McWatt has been called Susie Wong, Pocahontas and "black bitch," and... Read more

The Midnight Bargain

By: C.L. Polk
Narrated by: Moira Quirk
Length: 11 hours 49 minutes

“If you had to decide between your magical ability and love, which would you chose? Of course, it’s not that simple when your marriage will save your family from bankruptcy, but also take away more freedoms than you know. Sorcery, historical romance, feminism, female friendships, and reproductive rights — this enjoyable novel had everything I... Read more

Dominoes at the Crossroads

Short Stories

By: Kaie Kellough
Narrated by: Kaie Kellough
Length: 6 hours 21 minutes

Dominoes at the Crossroads maps an alternate Canada—one crisscrossed by a Caribbean diaspora seeking music, futures, and portals to their past.In this collection of stories, Kaie Kellough’s characters navigate race, history, and coming-of-age by way of their confessions and dreams. Through the eyes of jazz musicians, hitchhikers, quiet... Read more

Willie

The Game-Changing Story of the NHL's First Black Player

By: Willie O'Ree & Michael McKinley
Narrated by: Everett Fitzhugh
Length: 5 hours 54 minutes

An inspiring memoir that shows that anyone can achieve their dreams if they are willing to fight for them.

In 1958, Willie O'Ree was a lot like any other player toiling in the minors. He was good. Good enough to have been signed by the Boston Bruins. Just not quite good enough to play in the NHL.

Until January 18 of that year. O'Ree was finally... Read more

Butter Honey Pig Bread

By: Francesca Ekwuyasi
Narrated by: Amaka Umeh
Length: 12 hours 10 minutes

2021 CANADA READS FINALIST Longlisted for the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize An intergenerational saga about three Nigerian women: a novel about food, family, and forgiveness. Butter Honey Pig Bread is a story of choices and their consequences, of motherhood, of the malleable line between the spirit and the mind, of finding new homes and... Read more

The Island of Forgetting

A Novel

By: Jasmine Sealy
Narrated by: Varia Williams
Length: 8 hours 37 minutes

WINNER of the Amazon First Novel AwardFinalist for the Kobo Emerging Writer AwardFinalist for OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean LiteratureHow does memory become myth? How do lies become family lore? How do we escape the trauma of the past when the truth has been forgotten? Barbados, 1962. Lost soul Iapetus roams the island, scared and alone, driven... Read more

AfriCANthology

AfriCANthology

By: A. Gregory Frankson
Narrated by: A. Gregory Frankson, Coriolan, Alicia Cox, Chloe Savoie-Bernard, Dwayne Morgan, Jade Holness, Nathan Thompson, Nathanael Richards, Phillip Morgan, Simone Germain, Tara Taylor & Thandiwe McCarthy
Length: 7 hours 6 minutes

Truth spoken plainly and powerfully is difficult to dismiss and impossible to ignore. Edited with purpose by A. Gregory Frankson, AfriCANthology: Perspectives of Black Canadian Poets brings together some of Canada's most influential dub, page, and spoken word poetic voices and gives them space to speak freely about their personal journeys in... Read more

The Girl in the Middle

Growing Up Between Black and White, Rich and Poor

By: Anais Granofsky
Narrated by: Joniece Abbott-Pratt
Length: 5 hours 47 minutes

In this poignant and timely memoir—written with the searing power of Beautiful Struggle and Born a Crime—Degrassi Junior High star Anais Granofsky contemplates the lingering impact of a childhood spent in two opposite and warring worlds.Though recognized around the world for her role as Lucy Hernandez on the hit show Degrassi, Anais Granofsky’s... Read more

Old Goriot

By: Honoré de Balzac
Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
Length: 10 hours 24 minutes

Balzac's universally loved novel explores the great theme of money and its effect on the human character. Old Goriot is a lodger at Madame Vanquer's Parisian boardinghouse. At first, his wealth inspires respect, but as his circumstances are reduced, he is gradually shunned by the others. He moves into smaller and less desirable rooms in the... Read more

On Property

Policing, Prisons, and the Call for Abolition

Field Notes

By: Rinaldo Walcott
Narrated by: David Andrew Reid
Length: 3 hours 51 minutes

From plantation rebellion to prison labour’s super-exploitation, Walcott examines the relationship between policing and property.That a man can lose his life for passing a fake $20 bill when we know our economies are flush with fake money says something damning about the way we’ve organized society. Yet the intensity of the calls to abolish... Read more

Son of Elsewhere

A Memoir in Pieces

By: Elamin Abdelmahmoud
Narrated by: Elamin Abdelmahmoud
Length: 6 hours 30 minutes

A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR • A “funny and frank” (The New York Times) collection of essays on Blackness, faith, pop culture, and the challenges—and rewards—of finding one’s way in the world, from a BuzzFeed editor and podcast host.

“A memoir that is immense in its desire to give . . . a rich offering of image, of music, of... Read more

Dear Current Occupant

By: Chelene Knight
Narrated by: Karen Jewels
Length: 2 hours 8 minutes

Dear Current Occupant is a creative nonfiction memoir about home and belonging set in the 80s and 90s of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.Using a variety of forms including letters, essays and poems, Knight reflects on her childhood through a series of letters addressed to all of the current occupants now living in the twenty different houses she... Read more

The Stone Sky: Booktrack Edition

The Broken Earth: Book #3

By: N. K. Jemisin
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Length: 14 hours 16 minutes

The Stone Sky: Booktrack Edition adds an immersive musical soundtrack to your audiobook listening experience! *
Humanity will finally be saved or destroyed in the shattering conclusion to the post-apocalyptic and highly acclaimed NYT bestselling trilogy that won the Hugo Award three years in a row.
The Moon will soon return. Whether this heralds... Read more

The Obelisk Gate

The Broken Earth: Book #2

By: N. K. Jemisin
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Length: 13 hours 19 minutes

Essun's missing daughter grows more powerful every day, and her choices may destroy the world in this "magnificent" Hugo Award winner and NYT Notable Book. (NPR)

The season of endings grows darker, as civilization fades into the long cold night.

Essun -- once Damaya, once Syenite, now avenger -- has found shelter, but not her daughter. Instead... Read more

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

By: Maya Angelou
Narrated by: Maya Angelou
Length: 10 hours 10 minutes

Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide. Her life story is told in the documentary film And Still I Rise, as seen on PBS’s American Masters.

Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute... Read more

Queenie

By: Candice Carty-Williams
Narrated by: Shvorne Marks
Length: 9 hours 45 minutes

“This was excellent on so many levels. It's been comped as a Bridget Jones + Americanah. But, I think that description does all three books a disservice. Queenie does have some LOL moments but it's has many more serious moments and issues. I listened to this and much of the listen, I was stressed as AF for Queenie. I listened to her make terrible... Read more

Let Me Hear a Rhyme

By: Tiffany D. Jackson
Narrated by: Korey Jackson, Nile Bullock, Adenrele Ojo & Adam Lazarre-White
Length: 9 hours 31 minutes

“I listened to this book on audio during my commute & read chapters while at home and enjoyed it in BOTH formats. The story of 3 friends trying to get a record deal for their murdered best friend & brother was strained in parts but the desire to see the outcome & my enjoyment of the characters carried me through. Read more

Parable of the Sower

Earthseed: Book #1

By: Octavia E. Butler
Narrated by: Lynne Thigpen
Length: 12 hours 2 minutes

Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author Octavia E. Butler paints a stunning portrait of an all-too-believable near future. As with Kindred and her other critically-acclaimed novels, Parable of the Sower skillfully combines startling visionary and socially realistic concepts. God is change. That is the central truth of the Earthseed movement, whose... Read more

Deacon King Kong (Oprah's Book Club)

A Novel

By: James McBride
Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
Length: 14 hours 5 minutes

“An amazing cast of characters and compelling storyline coupled with fantastic dialogue delivers a dynamic novel. One one level this is a great story, but on so many other levels it touches on the Great Migration and class and society - and also how regular folks cross many divides to simply just support each other through life. A great audiobook... Read more