Happy release: The Blueprint by Rae Giana Rashad

The Blueprint
by Rae Giana Rashad
Dystopian, African American | Published: February 13, 2024
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In the vein of Octavia E. Butler and Margaret Atwood, a harrowing novel set in an alternate United States—a world of injustice and bondage in which a young Black woman becomes the concubine of a powerful white government official and must face the dangerous consequences. ~*~ Solenne Bonet lives in Texas where choice no longer exists. An algorithm determines a Black woman’s occupation, spouse, and residence. Solenne finds solace in penning the biography of Henriette, an ancestor who’d been an enslaved concubine to a wealthy planter in 1800s Louisiana. But history repeats itself when Solenne, lonely and naïve, finds herself entangled with Bastien Martin, a high-ranking government official. Solenne finds the psychological bond unbearable, so she considers alternatives. With Henriette as her guide, she must decide whether and how to leave behind all she knows.
Inspired by the lives of enslaved concubines to U.S. politicians and planters, The Blueprint unfolds over dual timelines to explore bodily autonomy, hypocrisy, and power imbalances through the lens of the nation’s most unprotected: a Black girl.

First sentence:
The men called her Henriette, but it wasn't her name. She promised herself she would never think it, never say it, never answer to it. It wouldn't be her name.

Happy release: Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez

Take My Hand
by Dolen Perkins-Valdez
Historical, African American | Published: 2022 | Goodreads
Montgomery, Alabama 1973. Fresh out of nursing school, Civil Townsend has big plans to make a difference, especially in her African American community. At the Montgomery Family Planning Clinic, she intends to help women make their own choices for their lives and bodies.

But when her first week on the job takes her down a dusty country road to a worn down one-room cabin, she’s shocked to learn that her new patients are children—just 11 and 13 years old. Neither of the Williams sisters has even kissed a boy, but they are poor and Black and for those handling the family’s welfare benefits that’s reason enough to have the girls on birth control. As Civil grapples with her role, she takes India, Erica and their family into her heart. Until one day, she arrives at the door to learn the unthinkable has happened and nothing will ever be the same for any of them.

Decades later, with her daughter grown and a long career in her wake, Dr. Civil Townsend is ready to retire, to find her peace and to leave the past behind. But there are people and stories that refuse to be forgotten.That must not be forgotten.

Because history repeats what we don’t remember.

Black Publishing Power

Black Publishing Power
June 14 to June 20, 2020
#BlackoutBestsellerlist #BlackPublishingPower
Purchase any two books by Black writers to...

Blackout bestseller lists with Black voices
My picks:

I'm Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness
by Austin Channing Brown
Memoir | Goodreads

Girl, Woman, Other
by Bernardine Evaristo
Contemporary, Short Stories, Man Booker Prize 2019 | Goodreads

The City We Became
by N.K. Jemisin
Fantasy, SciFi, New York | Goodreads

The Nickel Boys
by Colson Whitehead
Historical, Pulitzer Prize 2020 | Goodreads

The Parking Lot Attendant by Nafkote Tamirat

The Parking Lot Attendant
by Nafkote Tamirat

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Published: 2018
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Genre: Literary, African American, Ethiopia
Hardback: 240
Rating: 5

First sentence(s):
My father and I are the newest and least liked members of the colony on the island of B—.

A mesmerizing, indelible coming-of-age story about a girl in Boston's tightly-knit Ethiopian community who falls under the spell of a charismatic hustler out to change the world

A haunting story of fatherhood, national identity, and what it means to be an immigrant in America today, Nafkote Tamirat's The Parking Lot Attendant explores how who we love, the choices we make, and the places we’re from combine to make us who we are.

The story begins on an undisclosed island where the unnamed narrator and her father are the two newest and least liked members of a commune that has taken up residence there. Though the commune was built on utopian principles, it quickly becomes clear that life here is not as harmonious as the founders intended. After immersing us in life on the island, our young heroine takes us back to Boston to recount the events that brought her here. Though she and her father belong to a wide Ethiopian network in the city, they mostly keep to themselves, which is how her father prefers it.

This detached existence only makes Ayale’s arrival on the scene more intoxicating. The unofficial king of Boston’s Ethiopian community, Ayale is a born hustler—when he turns his attention to the narrator, she feels seen for the first time. Ostensibly a parking lot attendant, Ayale soon proves to have other projects in the works, which the narrator becomes more and more entangled in to her father’s growing dismay. By the time the scope of Ayale’s schemes—and their repercussions—become apparent, our narrator has unwittingly become complicit in something much bigger and darker than she ever imagined.

My two-bits:

The writing is just as charismatic as the charismatic character, Ayale in this story. Loved how the story unfolds in a flashback fashion.

Got me thinking of power, leadership and cults.

~*~
* Named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year
Shortlisted for the Center For Fiction First Novel Prize
Named a Booklist Best Book of the Year

* part of the Tournament of Books 2019 (here)

An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

An American Marriage
by Tayari Jones

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Just released: February 2018
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Genre: Literary, African American
Hardback: 320
Rating: 5

First sentence(s):
There are two kinds of people in the world, those who leave home and those who don't.

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to twelve years for a crime Celestial knows he didn’t commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison passes, she is unable to hold on to the love that has been her center. After five years, Roy’s conviction is suddenly overturned, and he returns to Atlanta ready to resume their life together.

My two-bits:

Epistolary parts is effective in portraying the characters and in creating a nice variety in writing style in this story.

Nice blend of what a marriage goes through with conflicts that include a spouse in prison, artist life and a love triangle.

~*~
* part of Rooster Summer Reading Challenge 2018 (here)

No One Is Coming to Save Us by Stephanie Powell Watts

No One Is Coming to Save Us
by Stephanie Powell Watts
narrated by Janina Edwards

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Published: 2017
Publisher: Ecco
Genre: Literary, African American
Hardback: 384
Rating: 4

First sentence(s):
The house he's building is done mostly.

JJ Ferguson has returned home to Pinewood, North Carolina, to build his dream house and to pursue his high school sweetheart, Ava. But as he reenters his former world, where factories are in decline and the legacy of Jim Crow is still felt, he’s startled to find that the people he once knew and loved have changed just as much as he has. Ava is now married and desperate for a baby, though she can’t seem to carry one to term. Her husband, Henry, has grown distant, frustrated by the demise of the furniture industry, which has outsourced to China and stripped the area of jobs. Ava’s mother, Sylvia, caters to and meddles with the lives of those around her, trying to fill the void left by her absent son. And Don, Sylvia’s unworthy but charming husband, just won’t stop hanging around.

JJ’s return—and his plans to build a huge mansion overlooking Pinewood and woo Ava—not only unsettles their family, but stirs up the entire town. The ostentatious wealth that JJ has attained forces everyone to consider the cards they’ve been dealt, what more they want and deserve, and how they might go about getting it. Can they reorient their lives to align with their wishes rather than their current realities? Or are they all already resigned to the rhythms of the particular lives they lead?

No One Is Coming to Save Us is a revelatory debut from an insightful voice: with echoes of The Great Gatsby it is an arresting and powerful novel about an extended African American family and their colliding visions of the American Dream. In evocative prose, Stephanie Powell Watts has crafted a full and stunning portrait that combines a universally resonant story with an intimate glimpse into the hearts of one family.

My two-bits:

An African American experience with all the drama as mentioned in the description that is Gatsby-esque. Like in Gatsby the characters are unlikable. However, the story draws you in.

~*~
* Listened to audiobook version.

* part of SJP's Book Club (here)

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

Homegoing
by Yaa Gyasi
narrated by Dominic Hoffman

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Published: 2016
Publisher: Knopf
Genre: Historican, Literary, African American
Hardback: 320
Rating: 5

First sentence(s):
The night Effia Otcher was born into the musky heat of Fanteland, a fire raged through the woods just outside her father's compound.

The unforgettable New York Times best seller begins with the story of two half-sisters, separated by forces beyond their control: one sold into slavery, the other married to a British slaver. Written with tremendous sweep and power, Homegoing traces the generations of family who follow, as their destinies lead them through two continents and three hundred years of history, each life indeliably drawn, as the legacy of slavery is fully revealed in light of the present day.

Effia and Esi are born into different villages in eighteenth-century Ghana. Effia is married off to an Englishman and lives in comfort in the palatial rooms of Cape Coast Castle. Unbeknownst to Effia, her sister, Esi, is imprisoned beneath her in the castle’s dungeons, sold with thousands of others into the Gold Coast’s booming slave trade, and shipped off to America, where her children and grandchildren will be raised in slavery. One thread of Homegoing follows Effia’s descendants through centuries of warfare in Ghana, as the Fante and Asante nations wrestle with the slave trade and British colonization. The other thread follows Esi and her children into America. From the plantations of the South to the Civil War and the Great Migration, from the coal mines of Pratt City, Alabama, to the jazz clubs and dope houses of twentieth-century Harlem, right up through the present day, Homegoing makes history visceral, and captures, with singular and stunning immediacy, how the memory of captivity came to be inscribed in the soul of a nation.

My two-bits:

From the 1800s to present, perspectives of both the African and African American experiences are portrayed through various characters.

Beautifully written with references to past histories, spirits and folk tales.


~*~
* Listened to audiobook version.

* Winner of the NBCC's John Leonard First Book Prize
A New York Times 2016 Notable Book
One of Oprah’s 10 Favorite Books of 2016
NPR's Debut Novel of the Year
One of Buzzfeed's Best Fiction Books Of 2016
One of Time's Top 10 Novels of 2016, Winner of 2017 PEN Hemingway award for debut fiction.

* part of Tournament of Books 2017 (here)

The Turner House by Angela Flournoy

The Turner House
by Angela Flournoy

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Published: 2015
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Genre: African American, Literary
Hardback: 352 pages
Rating: 4

First sentence(s):
The eldest six of Francis and Viola Turner's thirteen children claimed that the big room of the house on Yarrow Street was haunted for at least one night.

The Turners have lived on Yarrow Street for over fifty years. Their house has seen thirteen children grown and gone—and some returned; it has seen the arrival of grandchildren, the fall of Detroit’s East Side, and the loss of a father. The house still stands despite abandoned lots, an embattled city, and the inevitable shift outward to the suburbs. But now, as ailing matriarch Viola finds herself forced to leave her home and move in with her eldest son, the family discovers that the house is worth just a tenth of its mortgage. The Turner children are called home to decide its fate and to reckon with how each of their pasts haunts—and shapes—their family’s future.

Praised by Ayana Mathis as “utterly moving” and “un-putdownable,” The Turner House brings us a colorful, complicated brood full of love and pride, sacrifice and unlikely inheritances. It’s a striking examination of the price we pay for our dreams and futures, and the ways in which our families bring us home.

My two-bits:

If you like the family drama genre then this is one for you with lots of mini-stories within. And, it all revolves around a family home.

This novel takes a look into an African American (big) family and all its members in details that make each memorable in their unique ways.

~*~

Tournament of Books short list nominee (details)