Black authorship brought us works like, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Roots, Americanah, Kindred, and If Beale Street Could Talk, to share a black narrative with black people in it, for black people.
Jupiter Hammon, broke the seal in 1760, with his poem, An Evening Thought: Salvation By Christ with Penitential Cries. Phyllis Wheatley, the first black published woman, followed in 1773 with a collection of religious and moral poems. Since then, published works by black authors have poured into our communities ranging in genres from science fiction and biographies to steamy erotica.
In 2017, a new wave of black authors has emerged with an enormous presence in children’s books, self-help, spirituality, health, and fiction. Here’s a fresh list of recent and soon to launch titles, written by black people, because the more you read, the more you know.
For The Kids
Title: Adventures with Jade: The Microphone of Friendship
Author: Chris Coleman
Release Date: March 2017
Synopsis: When the Microphone of Friendship is mysteriously stolen from the Imagination Kingdom, one 6-year-old girl named Jade and her stuffed panda, Rhythm must embark on an epic superhero adventure to find the lost item. And save the day…all before dinner.
Title: Teaching Your African American Child About Finances
Author: Jackie Whitehead
Release Date: November 2017
Synopsis: Jazmine wants a dog, but her parents want to teach her the about costs of caring for a dog. Jazmine must make a budget to see if she can really afford what she wants and boy the money challenges are a big shock for her!
Title: Juris Prudence Goes to Law School
Author: Jessica N. Childress
Release Date: July 2017
Synopsis: The Briefcase of Juris P. Prudence, a fictional novel about an 11 year-old lawyer who fights for children's rights. The book is the first in an anticipated series, with subsequent books to be released this year.
TITLE: Sela and the Missing Key
Author: Alisia Dale
Release Date: August 2017.
Synopsis Enchanting and surprising, this book takes readers on a fun quest through the musical village of Chateuguay. When Sela Blue and her sisters, Susie and Sophie, can’t find the key to their charming house on Wagner Street they set off in search of the missing key.
Career
Title: Bossed Up ( 100 Truths To Becoming Your Own Boss, God’s Way!)
Author: Tamar Huggins
Release Date: February 2017
Synopsis: Bossed Up is the indispensable owner's manual to spearheading your potential and becoming your own boss, the way God intended. Bossed Up was created as a guide to help you work through the inevitable dilemmas you will face on your journey toward becoming your own boss.
Title: F.L.A.G. (Fraud, Lies & Greed)
Author: Antony E. Ghee
Release Date: March 2017
Synopsis: Professional athletes earn millions of dollars but far too often are subjected to fraudulent schemes by con artists who prey on their wealth and vulnerabilities. This book explores cautionary tales of professional athletes who have fallen victim to fraud, exposes those who engage in fraudulent behavior, and examines why and how they do it.
Title: The Little Black Book of Backstage Etiquette
Author: Brenda Braxton
Release: June 2017
Synopsis: FINALLY! A book that just might be the secret to having a long lasting theater career! The Little Black Book of Backstage Etiquette, is the weapon needed to thrive and survive in this crazy arena called “Show Business”.
Self-Help
Title: Wife.Mom.Entreprenuer – 23 Tips and Lessons To Juggling It All
Co-Authors: Lanise Herman Thomas & Janine Smalls-Gueye
Release Date: December 2016
Synopsis: Wife. Mom. Entrepreneur. 23 Tips and Lessons to Juggling It All is your reference guide to the tried-and-true juggling act to financial wealth building while being a wife, mom, and entrepreneur. This book was birthed out of the trials, tribulations, and triumphs of becoming wives, moms, and entrepreneurs, and is the vehicle for all modern-day wives, moms, and entrepreneurs to elude marriage vulnerability, family disappointments, mistrust, and trivial business failures.
Title: The Frazier Chronicles: Stories Untold: Finding Peace After Pain
Authors: Jamie Frazier and 10 Frazier women
Publisher: Jai the Author Publishing
Release Date: January 2017
Synopsis: For almost 100 years, the women in this family held on to secrets. Finally, after years of keeping silent, the Frazier women speak out, In this collection of stories untold, you get a front row seat of how these resilient ladies adapted to their environment, created a plan of survival, and learned how to live and love again.
Title: Vid’s Viddles
Author: Vid Lamonte Buggs Jr.
Release Date: January 2017
Synopsis: With “Vid’s Viddles,” eclectic writer Vid Buggs opens a new season of freedom, insight and joy. These collections of short motivational pieces offer words of wisdom about life, love, spirit, leadership, friendship, pain, fear, happiness, to inspire personal growth through tough times, helping adults and teens stay vital and in love with life, savoring the beauty that each day brings.
Title: Vision – Seeing Is Achieving
Author: Allan Sealy
Release Date: February 2017
Synopsis: This book will inspire you to believe in your dreams and hangout in your future. Your future is ahead of you – it lies within you. See beyond the limitations of your circumstances and dare to dream big.
Title: A Stroke of Faith: A Stroke Survivor’s Story of a Second Chance at Living a Life of Significance
Author: Mark Moore
Release Date: April 2017
Synopsis: Moore shares his powerful journey through recovery from two strokes that should have taken his life. This extraordinary memoir tells the story of moving from acceptance to surrender and from hope to faith, and will inspire anyone that is facing difficult circumstances.
Title: Protect Me: A Guide to Protect Young Black Women
Author: Daria Wright
Release Date: May 2017
Synopsis: Daria Wright's debut book, is a book sure to get tongues wagging. Daria puts on her "counselor" hat speaking to the hearts of the black man (and woman), as she analyzes oppressive stereotypes and destructive myths in this self-help page turner.
Title: Answers Unleashed: Reshape Your Brain in 30 Days with Science for Success
Author: Olympia LePoint
Release Date: August 2017
Synopsis: Answers Unleashed is an empowering, self-help book that reveals the suffocating effects trauma, physical pain and fear have on the brain’s ability to create personal success and invent new technology. With her thrilling real-life stories as the backdrop, Olympia LePoint introduces the power of the TRIABRAIN and redefines the human brain’s most vital sectors using Einstein’s Theory of Relativity.
Title: Black Mom Magic: How to Use What You Got to Get What You Want
Author: Neoshi Green-Kebreau
Release Date: December 2016
Synopsis: Black Mom Magic: How to Use What You Got to Get What You Want is a solutions-based guide that helps you create the change you want to see in your life. Providing real-life solutions, this book will teach you 18 powerful "tricks" to get what you what every single time despite time, money, or mommy duties.
Spirituality
Title: Sexless Single: How to Stay Sexless in a Sex Filled Whole
Author: Jill Bulluck and Eight Contributing Female Authors
Release Date: January 2017
Synopsis: Sexless Single shares the steps of how to avoid the pitfalls of sexual immorality as a single Christian. Throughout the book, Jill walks you through t three major steps you must take to honor your mind, body and spirit as a living sacrifice to God and live as a sexless single.
Intimacy and Relationships
Title : Emotional and Sexual Intimacy in Marriage: How to Connect or Reconnect With Your Spouse, Grow Together, and Strengthen Your Marriage
Author: Marcus and Ashley Kusi
Release Date: March 2017
Synopsis: This book shares The Kusi’s first-hand experience of learning how to reconnect and strengthen intimacy in our marriage with other married couples.
Title: Just One Kiss
Author: B.B. McNeil
Release Date: April 2017
Synopsis: Leah Simone Bradshaw just arrived in Washington, D.C. hoping to put miles between her new life and the relationship turmoil left behind in Seattle. Matthew Morrison spent most of his pre-teen years being the ugly duckling but has no plans to return. Trapped inside an insatiable world of sex and secrets, Leah and Matthew prove one kiss is rarely just a kiss.
Title: Wives Who Win "The Untold Secrets to Building the Marriage of Your Dreams"
Author: Montreal Ravenel
Release Date: May 2017
Synopsis: Wives who win is a step by step guide to help position wives to win in their marriage. This resource will show you how to make decisions daily, how to forgive, to love, to accept, respect one another and accept each others differences so that you can build the marriage of your dreams.
Fiction
Title: COLD FLASH
Author: Carrie Johnson
Release Date: May 2017
Synopsis: The sequel to Johnson’s Hot Flash takes Muriel Mabley into the interconnected worlds of Philadelphia gangs and the mafia. As Muriel is training for a triathlon, she is swimming in the Schuylkill River, when dead bodies float to the surface. One of the bodies is her son’s girlfriend, dead from a heroin overdose.
Title: A House Divided
Author: Donna Hill
Release Date: June 2017
Synopsis: Journalist Zoie Crawford had to leave New Orleans to finally make her own life. Her grandmother, Claudia, inspired her to follow her dreams but with her grandmothers’ passing, Zoie reluctantly returns home, where the past is written in the lonely corners of the bayou and the New South's supercharged corridors of power, and there she discovers a stunning, painstakingly kept secret.
Title: Live Through This: Surviving the Intersections of Sexuality, God, and Race
Author: Clay Cane
Release Date: June 2017
Synopsis: Live Through This is a collection of essays that marches you through the journey of Clay Cane's life, from enduring spiritual violence in the African-American church, to learning unique lessons from transgender sex workers, to living in the double consciousness of blackness and gayness. Cane's tender writing gives voice to the voiceless as he tells the stories that haven't been told by traveling beyond the lens of race and sexuality.
Title: Between Lost & Found
Author: Shelly Stratton
Release Date: July 2017
Synopsis: Janelle Marshall's life is finally going according to plan. But she gets a distressing call: Litte Bill , the grandfather that raised her, has gone missing. Now Janelle must go to the tiny mountain town of Mammoth Falls, South Dakota, where tracking down her eccentric grandfather is easier said than done.
Health
Title: The Kingdom of God Permanent Weight Loss Principles
Author: Trina Claiborne
Release Date: March 2017
Synopsis – Going through the modules and task within the course of this book produce 4 major winning benefits.
Title: The Busy Woman’s 21- Day Guide to Clean Eating
Author: Dr. Jamie Hardy
Release Date: April 2017
Synopsis: The Busy Woman’s 21-Day Guide to Clean Eating. In this guidebook, Dr. Jamie Hardy offers help and hope for breaking the cycle of unhealthy eating that so many women face every day.
Title: EVERY BODY YOGA: Let Go of Fear, Get on the Mat, Love Your Body
Author: Jessamyn Stanley
Release Date: April 2017
Synopsis: In Every Body Yoga, Stanley upends the paradigm by showing that yoga isn’t about how one looks, but how one feels. To that end, she shares her own deeply personal stories that lead to a yoga flow she uses when she needs to access a certain feeling: “I Want to Energize My Spirit,” “I Need to Release Fear.”
Title: Clearing Spaces: Inspirational Techniques to Heal Your Home
Author: Khi Armand
Release Date: 2017
Synopsis: "Out with the bad energy, in with the good! Khi Armand, a specialist in space clearing with expertise in rootwork and shamanism, offers a fantastic illustrated guide to help laypersons diagnose and resolve energetic issues in their home, office, or any structure.
