A selection of books we have at GCH library (and a few that I recommend or am looking to read myself) that explore race and celebrate black voices. This list is by no means comprehensive and we would welcome your recommendations to add to the library collection.
Books we have at the library
Natives - Akala
The Color Purple - Alice Walker
Sold as a Slave - Olaudah Equiano
Their Eyes Were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston
Beloved - Toni Morrison (and all Toni Morrison’s books!)
Half of a Yellow Sun and Purple Hibiscus - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings - Maya Angelou
Becoming - Michelle Obama
Small Island - Andrea Levy
Another Country; Giovanni's Room & Go Tell It On the Mountain - James Baldwin
Black and British: A Forgotten History - David Olusoga
Kindred - Octavia Butler
Over a Thousand Hills I Walk With You - Hanna Jansen
Crossing the River & Cambridge - Caryl Phillips
Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
Stay With Me - Ayobami Adebayo
The Spider King’s Daughter - Chibundu Onuzo
Tail of the Blue Bird - Nii Ayikwei Parkes (Ghanaian murder mystery)
Second Class Citizen; The Slave Girl & The Bride Price - Buchi Emecheta
Young Adult Fiction
The Poet X and With the Fire on High - Elizabeth Acevedo
Long Way Down - Jason Reynolds
Kwame Alexander’s books
The Whale Rider - Witi Ihimaera [the first Maori writer to publish a novel]
The Hate U Give and On the Come Up - Angie Thomas
Dear Martin - Nic Stone
Noughts and Crosses series - Malorie Blackman
Black Panther: A Nation Under Our Feet - Ta-Nehisi Coates & Brian Stelfreeze
The Black Flamingo - Dean Atta
Children of Blood and Bone - Tomi Adeyemi
Lies We Tell Ourselves - Robin Talley
The Icarus Girl - Helen Oyeyemi
March - John Lewis & Andrew Aydin
Blended - Sharon M. Draper
Books we do not have in the library yet but I heartily recommend
Nervous Conditions - Tsitsi Dangarembga
Omeros - Derek Walcott (we do have Walcott’s selected poetry)
The poetry of Langston Hughes
The Lonely Londoners - Sam Selvon
Black Skin, White Masks - Frantz Fanon
Wole Soyinka’s plays
On my reading list
Monster - Walter Dean Myers
A Wreath for Emmett Till - Marilyn Nelson
Miles Morales: Spider-Man - Jason Reynolds
Second Class Citizen - Buchi Emecheta (also her autobiography Head Above Water)
The poetry of Linton Kwesi Johnson
Afropean: Notes From Black Europe - Johnny Pitts
The Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion - Kei Miller
Don't Touch My Hair - Emma Dabiri
