Black Girl Booksta Tour
A Black History Month tour featuring recommendations by Black Bookstagrammers celebrating Black Women in Literature.
Unforgivable Love
A Retelling of Dangerous Liaisons
By Sophfronia Scott
Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
Length: 16 hours 22 minutes
In this vivid reimagining of the French classic Les Liaisons Dangereuses, it’s the summer when Jackie Robinson breaks Major League Baseball’s color barrier and a sweltering stretch has Harlem’s elite fleeing the city for Westchester County’s breezier climes, two predators stalk amidst the manicured gardens and fine old homes.
Heiress Mae Malveaux... Read more »
Vibrate Higher Daily
Live Your Power
By Lalah Delia
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 4 hours 2 minutes
Tap into your inner power with this mind-opening guide to vibrational-based living from Instagram star and self-help pioneer behind the internet community Vibrate Higher Daily.
“There is another way of being in the world. There is a better way to exist, rise, move beyond, and take our power back.”
Too often we feel pulled down by circumstances or... Read more »
The Confessions of Frannie Langton
A Novel
By Sara Collins
Narrated by: Sara Collins & Roy McMillan
Length: 12 hours 13 minutes
The Confessions of Frannie Langton
“Drawing on her experiences of growing up in the Cayman Islands, attending university in London, and practicing law, outstanding debut author Sara Collins has drawn a character one will not soon forget. Told with evocative language, Frannie Langton’s confession is a life story not to be missed. Raised on a sugar plantation in Jamaica, then transported to a life of servitude in London, Frannie lives a life of twists and turns of love and betrayal that will both shock and intrigue you. I was as tense as she was waiting for the verdict to be handed down. Thank you, Sara Collins!”
Mary Mollman, Booked
How to Catch a Queen
Runaway Royals
By Alyssa Cole
Narrated by: Karen Chilton
Length: 10 hours 53 minutes
If you enjoyed When No One Is Watching, then you’ll love How to Catch a Queen.
“After reading "When No One Is Watching" by the brilliant Alyssa Cole, I couldn't wait to get my hands on "How To Catch A Queen", the first of her Runaway Royals series. This novel is the perfect update to the regency romance subgenre! Strong female representation, a setting rich in culture and tradition up against changes that threaten the patriarchy, and an arranged marriage are the makings of a highly entertaining romance. Not to mention the dazzling narration by Karen Chilton (her reading had me laughing out loud more than once!). This is my first romance by Alyssa Cole, and now I can't wait to work my way through her backlist!”
Jessica, Main Street Books Davidson
Happily Ever Afters
By Elise Bryant
Narrated by: Jordan Cobb
Length: 10 hours 18 minutes
Jane the Virgin meets To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before in this charming debut romantic comedy filled with Black Girl Magic. Perfect for fans of Mary H. K. Choi and Nicola Yoon, with crossover appeal for readers of Jasmine Guillory and Talia Hibbert romances.
Sixteen-year-old Tessa Johnson has never felt like the protagonist in her own life.... Read more »
God Help the Child
A novel
By Toni Morrison
Narrated by: Toni Morrison
Length: 5 hours 44 minutes
Spare and unsparing, God Help the Child—the first novel by Toni Morrison to be set in our current moment—weaves a tale about the way the sufferings of childhood can shape, and misshape, the life of the adult.
At the center: a young woman who calls herself Bride, whose stunning blue-black skin is only one element of her beauty, her boldness and... Read more »
The Street
By Ann Petry & Tayari Jones
Narrated by: Danielle Deadwyler
Length: 13 hours 25 minutes
The classic urban tale of a young black woman's struggle to raise her son alone amid the violence, poverty, and racial dissonance of 1940s Harlem. Read more »
How to Love a Jamaican
Stories
By Alexia Arthurs
Narrated by: Janina Edwards, Adenrele Ojo, Dominic Hoffman & James Fouhey
Length: 7 hours 3 minutes
“In these kaleidoscopic stories of Jamaica and its diaspora we hear many voices at once. All of them convince and sing. All of them shine.”—Zadie Smith
An O: The Oprah Magazine “Top 15 Best of the Year” • A Well-Read Black Girl’s Pick
Tenderness and cruelty, loyalty and betrayal, ambition and regret—Alexia Arthurs navigates these tensions to... Read more »
Social Purpose Annual Report
As we look to the future as a Social Purpose Corporation, we’re committed to serving readers and independent bookstores. Read our 2020 Annual Report to see an overview of the year.
Read the Report
My Sister, the Serial Killer
A Novel
By Oyinkan Braithwaite
Narrated by: Adepero Oduye
Length: 4 hours 14 minutes
My Sister, the Serial Killer
“My Sister, the Serial Killer is one of the best books to come along in quite a while — fast, funny, and completely engrossing. Oyinkan Braithwaite offers up a tale of Nigerian sisters Ayoola, a beautiful and sociopathic serial killer who destroys boyfriends, aware that all they ever want her for is her appearance, and Korede, a nurse whose average looks leave her continually passed up in preference for Ayoola. Still, taciturn and devoted Korede works hard to cover up her charming sister’s crimes. What will happen when they both fall for the same guy? At once a page-turner and a perversely righteous tale about the emptiness of physical beauty and the superficiality of being charmed by it, My Sister, the Serial Killer is entertaining, provoking, and utterly fascinating!”
Sarah Sorensen, Bookbug
When You Were Everything
By Ashley Woodfolk
Narrated by: Imani Parks
Length: 10 hours 17 minutes
For fans of Nina LaCour's We Are Okay and Adam Silvera's History Is All You Left Me, this heartfelt and ultimately uplifting novel follows one sixteen-year-old girl's friend breakup through two concurrent timelines--ultimately proving that even endings can lead to new beginnings.
"Stunning." --Nic Stone, bestselling author of Dear Martin and Odd... Read more »
This Is My America
By Kim Johnson
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 9 hours 34 minutes
If you enjoyed The Hate U Give, then you’ll love This Is My America.
“This is My America depicts the effects of police brutality and corrupt prosecution practices in America. Although there are similar Young Adult books tackling racism and police brutality, This is My America distinguishes itself by focusing on the emotional, physical, and financial impact of mass incarceration on the Black family. Johnson shows how the KKK is not a piece of history long-gone, but is an organization continuing to hunt down and torture Americans of color. Johnson explores generational trauma and the danger of being complicit mainly from the perspective of Tracy’s Black family, but also touches on the generational trauma of being a raised to be a racist and the danger of being complicit in that role. These parallel stories of the white and Black family are thought provoking, without centering the white narrative. Along with the personal struggles explored throughout the book, the plot includes a mystery element as Tracy investigates who the real murderers are.
This book narrated by Bahni Turpin, one of my favorite narrators! Turpin brings such life to each of the characters in her narrations, and this book was no different. I would recommend this book (especially the audiobook!) to young adults and adults that can handle content including police encounters, off the page murder, off the page lynching, racism, Black trauma, hate crimes, and police shooting.”Endya, Beausoleil Books
Transcendent Kingdom
A novel
By Yaa Gyasi
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 8 hours 40 minutes
Transcendent Kingdom
“This is a flippin’ gorgeous book. The writing is exquisite, the story is moving, and the characters are rendered with the skill of a true artist. Can you tell that I enjoyed this? Transcendent Kingdom is about Gifty, a young neuroscientist studying addiction. We come into her story just as she has taken her depressed mother into her care and is wrapping up an experiment. We see how her relationships with her mother, faith, and science have brought her to this point. If you need a book that is heartfelt and honest, read this one.”
Izzy, Off the Beaten Path
Caste (Oprah's Book Club)
The Origins of Our Discontents
By Isabel Wilkerson
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Length: 14 hours 25 minutes
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD LONGLIST • “An instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American century thus far.”—Dwight Garner, The New York Times
The Pulitzer Prize–winning, bestselling author of The Warmth of Other Suns examines the unspoken caste system that... Read more »
Killing the Black Body
Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty
By Dorothy Roberts
Narrated by: Shayna Small
Length: 14 hours 38 minutes
This is a no-holds-barred response to the liberal and conservative retreat from an assertive, activist, and socially transformative civil rights agenda of recent years--using a black feminist lens and the issue of the impact of recent legislation, social policy, and welfare "reform" on black women's--especially poor black women's--control over... Read more »
Don't Settle for Safe
Embracing the Uncomfortable to Become Unstoppable
By Sarah Jakes Roberts & Lisa Bevere
Narrated by: Sisi Johnson
Length: 5 hours 4 minutes
Popular speaker and author Sarah Jakes Roberts shows women they are not disqualified by their pain and failures and offers encouragement and strength to believe God’s best is still possible.
Everyone has experiences in their lives that stop them in their tracks and become burdens they carry with them everywhere they go. No one knows this better... Read more »
The Mothers
A Novel
By Brit Bennett
Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
Length: 9 hours 54 minutes
The Mothers
“The 'mothers' of this book's title refers to the gaggle of elderly churchgoing women who comment on the congregation around them, especially the trio of Nadia, Luke, and Aubrey. But The Mothers is about more than that -- it refers to the concept of motherhood, whether biological, lost, aborted, adoptive, or conflicted. The three young people at the heart of this story are all flawed, but their portrayals are realistic and they are easy for readers to support. This is a book about salvation -- not the spiritual salvation that the gossiping, but well-intentioned mothers seek, but the kind that comes with self-acceptance and growth. The Mothers is an honest, modern, and triumphant book.”
Jamie Thomas, Women & Children First
Corregidora
By Gayl Jones
Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
Length: 6 hours 3 minutes
The new edition of an American masterpiece, this is the harrowing story of Ursa Corregidora, a blues singer in the early 20th century forced to confront the inherited trauma of slavery.
A literary classic that remains vital to our understanding of the past, Corregidora is Gayl Jones’s powerful debut novel, examining womanhood, sexuality, and the... Read more »
Breathe
A Letter to My Sons
By Imani Perry
Narrated by: Imani Perry
Length: 4 hours 28 minutes
2020 Chautauqua Prize Finalist
2020 NAACP Image Award Nominee - Outstanding Literary Work (Nonfiction)
Best-of Lists: Best Nonfiction Books of 2019 (Kirkus Reviews) · 25 Can't-Miss Books of 2019 (The Undefeated)
Explores the terror, grace, and beauty of coming of age as a Black person in contemporary America and what it means to parent our... Read more »
The Healing
By Gayl Jones
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 10 hours 28 minutes
National Book Award finalist follows a black faith healer whose shrewd observations about human nature are told with the rich lyricism of the oral storytelling tradition.
From the acclaimed author of Corregidora, The Healing follows Harlan Jane Eagleton as she travels to small towns, converting skeptics, restoring minds, and healing bodies. But... Read more »
Black Girl Unlimited
The Remarkable Story of a Teenage Wizard
By Echo Brown
Narrated by: Echo Brown
Length: 8 hours 29 minutes
This program is read by the author
"Just brilliant."—Kirkus Reviews
Heavily autobiographical and infused with magical realism, Black Girl Unlimited fearlessly explores the intersections of poverty, sexual violence, depression, racism, and sexism—all through the arc of a transcendent coming-of-age story for fans of Renee Watson's Piecing Me... Read more »