AMERICAN DAUGHTERS by Piper Huguley. Portia Washington and Alice Roosevelt couldn’t be two more different people, and yet they had much more in common than people realize. It makes sense that they would become friends in real life. While their friendship is the book’s hook, AMERICAN DAUGHTERS is really a story about two women discovering who they are as individuals.
THE YELLOW WIFE by Sadeqa Johnson. This story of a young female slave’s struggle to survive imprisonment in Virginia’s infamous Hell’s Half Acre remains one of my favorite reads of all time. Everyone talks about Johnson’s HOUSE OF EVE but to me THE YELLOW WIFE was even better.
ISLAND QUEEN by Vanessa Riley. A fabulous book that everyone needs to read. Vanessa Riley did a brilliant job telling the story of Dorothy Kirwan Thomas, an 18th century slave who controlled her own destiny and made a fortune. Dorothy is a role model for all women.
THINGS PAST TELLING by Sheila Williams. This book chronicles the life of Maryam Grace, a West African girl who is captured by slave traders in the late 18th century. Over the next 100 plus years she lives a life filled with heartache, love, and adventure. Maryam is a strong, resilient woman who faces untold trials over her life. William has created such a wonderfully three-dimensional character that you can’t help but fall in love with Maryam and root for her to find happiness and freedom. The themes of motherhood, family, love and time will tug at your heart strings.
THE SECRET KEEPER OF MAIN STREET by Trisha R. Thomas. Bailey, a black dressmaker with the gift of second sight, finds herself drawn into local scandal and mystery when she agrees to help a Elsa Grimes, the local oil heiress with a terrible secret. So many secrets; so many plot twists. Thomas takes everything great about nighttime soaps and puts them in book form while simultaneously painting a vivid picture of 1950s Black America.
THE TRIAL OF MRS. RHINELANDER by Denny S. Bryce. Bryce brings this true story to life and gives us a complex portrait of a woman who suffered public humiliation when her rich – but weak – white husband decides to divorce her. In Bryce’s deft hands, this story about classism, racism, and the traumas of passing for white soars.
