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The Grafton Public Library presents…

The African American Experience

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   Book

Author

Dewey Number

Description

The Butler

Wil Haygood

92

ALL

Biography of White House butler Eugene Allen that inspired the Academy-Award nominated movie.

The Bridge

David Remnick

92

OBA

Biography of Barack Obama’s childhood and early political years, through the “prism of our racial history”.

My Lord, What A Morning

Marian Anderson

92 AND

Autobiography of singer Marian Anderson.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Maya Angelou

92 ANG

Nominated for a National Book Award in 1970, this well- known autobiography remained on the NY Times bestseller list for 2 years.

Bitch is the New Black

Helena Andrews

92 AND

Andrew’s twenty-first century take on being single, black, well-educated and female in the United States.

Up From Slavery

Booker T. Washington

92 WAS

A classic.

Malcolm

Bruce Perry

92 X

Biography of Malcolm X,  political leader assassinated at age 39.

The Measure of a Man

Sidney Poitier

92 POI

Autobiography of film star Sidney Poitier—whose career broke many racial barriers.

The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace

Jeff Hobs

92 PEA

Biography of Robert Peace, who left a ghetto outside of Newark to graduate from Yale University, yet died suddenly from involvement in the drug trade.

Between the World and Me

Ta-Nehisi Coates

305.8 COA

2015 National Book Award winner.

The Firebrand and the First Lady

Patricia Bell-Scott

920 BEL

A portrait of the friendship between Eleanor Roosevelt and social activist Pauli Murray.

The Invisibles

Jesse J. Holland

306.362

The untold story of African American slaves in the White House.

Gateway to Freedom

Eric Foner

973.711

FON

The  hidden history of the Underground Railroad.

Daisy Turner’s Kin

Jane C. Beck

929.2 BEC

An African American family saga about Grafton’s own Turner family.

A Mercy

Toni Morrison

FIC MOR

A tale by about the early days of slavery in the 1680s.

Freeman

Leonard Pitts, Jr.

FIC PIT

A post-Civil War story about the search for love and life after the end of slavery.

Miracle at St. Anna

James McBride

FIC MCB

Award-winning author of The Color of Water pens a fictional account of the famed Buffalo Soldiers of the 92nd Division in Italy in WWII.

The Buffalo Soldier

Chris Bohjalian

FIC BOH

Popular Vermont author Bohjalian explores the adoption of an African American child by white parents in this story set in northern Vermont.

Wench

Dolen Perkins-Valdez

FIC PER

A fascinating look at “moral complexities and racial intricacies” in America’s past through the story of a Southern resort, pre-Civil War, that exists for white men and their enslaved black mistresses.

Juneteenth

Ralph Ellison

 FIC ELL

Author explores relationship between a race-baiting US senator and the black minister who shares a secret past with him.

Invisible Man

Ralph Ellison

FIC ELL

Ellison won the 1953 National Book Award for this classic about the black experience.

 

The House Girl

Tara Conklin

FIC CON

A lawyer seeking reparations for the descendants of slaves uncovers a secret that rocks the art world.

A Stranger in the Kingdom

Howard Frank Mosher

FIC MOS

Set in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont in the 1950s, a newly hired black minister is accused of the murder of a teenaged girl and the community is torn apart.

Song Yet Sung

James McBride

FIC MCB

A gripping pre-Civil War tale of an escaped slave based on actual historic events.

New England White

Stephen L. Carter

FIC CAR

Story by an author that “does for members of the contemporary black upper class what Henry James did for Washington Square society”

Strivers Row

Kevin Baker

FIC

Historical fiction about the fateful meeting in Harlem, 1943 of Malcolm Little (Malcolm X) and Reverend Jonah Dove.

Americanah

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

FIC ADI

Immigrants from Nigeria confront many opportunities and challenges in the United States, including issues of race.