February's Bookseller Picks

What the Fireflies Knew

A Novel

By: Kai Harris
Narrated by: Zenzi Williams
Length: 8 hours 35 minutes

“What the Fireflies Knew is a fantastic, powerful debut that tackles difficult themes with empathy and respect. KB's voice is funny and heartbreaking. I expect this to be taught in schools someday alongside Toni Morrison. Read more

African Town

By: Charles Waters & Irene Latham
Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell, Ronald Peet, Andrew Eiden, Cary Hite, Sean Patrick Hopkins, Sandra Okuboyejo, Soneela Nankani, Nene Nwoko, Michael Obiora, Prentice Onayemi, Mark Sanderlin, Mirron Willis & Patrick Zeller
Length: 6 hours 50 minutes

Chronicling the story of the last Africans brought illegally to America in 1860, African Town is a powerful and stunning novel-in-verse.

In 1860, long after the United States outlawed the importation of enslaved laborers, 110 men, women and children from Benin and Nigeria were captured and brought to Mobile, Alabama aboard a ship called Clotilda.... Read more

The Violin Conspiracy

A Novel

By: Brendan Slocumb
Narrated by: JD Jackson & Brendan Slocumb
Length: 12 hours 4 minutes

“The TLDR version of this review is "I loved it." All the things I pack into the word love is astounding. I quite honestly don't know where to begin. I had to sit with this book and these feelings for a long time before I felt I could even begin to translate what was happening in my head and in my heart into words. I felt seen by this book. Fish... Read more

Vinyl Moon

By: Mahogany L. Browne
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 4 hours 57 minutes

“Bahni Turpin's narration of Mahogany L. Browne's Vinyl Moon was spectacular. The story and the performance pulled me into the protagonist, Angel's, world and kept me engaged there as she navigated a new school and city in her junior year of high school....I highly recommend this listen for anyone who needs to see that we're not defined by what's... Read more

Don't Cry for Me

A Novel

By: Daniel Black
Narrated by: Daniel Black
Length: 7 hours 27 minutes

“This book blew me away. Through intimate letters to his son, Jacob reconciles with the man he could have been. Daniel Black creates a stunning work on ancestral heritage, history, family, and the legacy of being a Black man in America. Read more

You Got Anything Stronger?

Stories

By: Gabrielle Union
Narrated by: Gabrielle Union
Length: 8 hours 8 minutes

“Funny, tender, and so good.” —Mindy Kaling, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Why Not Me?Remember when we hit it off so well that we decided We’re Going to Need More Wine? Well, this time you and I are going to turn to our friend the bartender and ask, You Got Anything Stronger? I promise to continue to make you laugh, but with this... Read more

His Truth Is Marching On

John Lewis and the Power of Hope

By: Jon Meacham
Narrated by: JD Jackson & Jon Meacham
Length: 10 hours

“Meacham's latest is a fascinating deep dive on John Lewis's formative years getting into good trouble as a civil rights activist in the 1960s. Anecdotes are pulled from both historical documentation and directly from interviews with Lewis himself. Narrator JD Jackson does a fantastic job, adding cadence for different speakers without a hint of... Read more

The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois

An Oprah’s Book Club Novel

By: Honoree Fanonne Jeffers
Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo, Karen Chilton & Prentice Onayemi
Length: 29 hours 48 minutes

“Jeffers is an award-winning poet and Du Bois scholar from her days at Bard College, and she harnesses the power of poetry, deeply researched history, and compelling narrative to craft a multi-generational saga of a Southern Black family. POWERFUL! Read more

Island Queen

A Novel

By: Vanessa Riley
Narrated by: Adjoa Andoh
Length: 21 hours 15 minutes

“Both sweeping and intimate, beautiful and painful, this novel based on the life of Dorothy Kirwan Thomas is exquisite. Riley’s research is palpable in the detail of each chapter, and readers will find themselves compulsively turning the pages until the end. Read more

The Prophets

By: Robert Jones, Jr.
Narrated by: Karen Chilton
Length: 14 hours 52 minutes

“I am at a loss for words. How can I even begin to describe the breathtaking language Robert Jones, Jr. has gifted us in his debut novel, The Prophets? How can I begin to explain how he achieves a feat so marvelous it almost seems impossible? Well, that’s the key word: almost. From his innovative restructuring of the Bible through the lens of... Read more

Skye Falling

A Novel

By: Mia McKenzie
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 11 hours 38 minutes

“I absolutely loved this debut novel by Mia McKenzie, featuring Skye, a Black queer 30-something woman returning to her hometown (Philly). Skye is an inconsiderate, commitment-phobe with an utterly relate-able knack for running away from her problems and re-writing history. Some might say she's unlikeable but I'll admit I was easily disarmed by... Read more

The 1619 Project

A New Origin Story

By: Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein
Narrated by: Nikole Hannah-Jones & Full Cast
Length: 18 hours 56 minutes

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A dramatic expansion of a groundbreaking work of journalism, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story offers a profoundly revealing vision of the American past and present.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Washington Post • NPR • Marie Claire
 
In late August 1619, a ship arrived in the British colony of... Read more

Harlem Shuffle

A Novel

By: Colson Whitehead
Narrated by: Dion Graham
Length: 10 hours 35 minutes

“A love letter to 1960s Harlem that’s also a heist novel, a family saga, and so much more. Colson Whitehead proves once again that he’s always at the top of his game! Read more

Within These Wicked Walls

A Novel

By: Lauren Blackwood
Narrated by: Nneka Okoye
Length: 8 hours 53 minutes

“The blend of magic and realism is fun and the heavy romance is a delight. Blackwood's skill at combining our reality, for instance, a religion with God (He) and all its accoutrements, slavery, and abuse, with a fantastical magical system involving amulets, evil spirits, blood-mad hyenas, and clay people, is well done. A well crafted homage to... Read more

My Monticello

Fiction

By: Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Narrated by: Aja Naomi King, January LaVoy, Landon Woodson, LeVar Burton, Ngozi Anyanwu & Tomiwa Edun
Length: 7 hours 35 minutes

“A dynamic, and timely, debut by a new voice in fiction, Jocelyn Nicole Johnson. This collection is comprised of five short stories and one novella all set in the state of Virginia. As you read these stories, you will experience, and feel, the gamut of human emotion as the voices and themes in each are different. The author explores race,... Read more

Son of the Storm

The Nameless Republic: Book #1

By: Suyi Davies Okungbowa
Narrated by: Korey Jackson
Length: 17 hours 45 minutes

From one of the most exciting new storytellers in epic fantasy, Son of the Storm is a sweeping tale of violent conquest and forgotten magic set in a world inspired by the pre-colonial empires of West Africa.

"Everything I love in a fantasy novel. Damn good stuff!" —Jenn Lyons, author of The Ruin of Kings

In the ancient. city of Bassa, Danso is a... Read more

Sankofa

A Novel

By: Chibundu Onuzo
Narrated by: Sara Powell
Length: 9 hours 2 minutes

“After her mother’s death, Anna finds a diary among her possessions. The diary of Anna’s father, a man she has never known and her mother has told her little about. As Anna reads the diary of the young man who fell in love with her mother, she begins to feel that she knows him and is understandably curious to learn what happened to him. At a... Read more

Black Nerd Problems

Essays

By: William Evans & Omar Holmon
Narrated by: William Evans & Omar Holmon
Length: 7 hours 53 minutes

“Searingly incisive, emotionally honest, LOL funny, and delivered with intense and sincere passion. Evans and Holmon thoughtfully explore issues of representation and stereotypes in forms of entertainment that often either get disregarded or receive a free pass. Even if you don’t know your X-Men from your X-Box, you’ll find plenty of food for... Read more

Blood Like Magic

Blood Like Magic

By: Liselle Sambury
Narrated by: Joniece Abbott-Pratt
Length: 16 hours 14 minutes

“What a phenomenal book!! This book takes place in the year 2049 but doesn't have a super futuristic-ky feel to it. It's a very plausible future, where tech has obviously advanced, but they still have Google, so it's not too far-fetched. I love the vast diversity in the book. The author, while seamlessly fitting in trans/gay/straight//cis... Read more