Black by Popular Demand
July may be ending but not your reading. We’re sending you to The Tiny Bookstore of Pittsburgh, PA this week.
Happy reading!
Fresh Juice
When Art's father can't get over a cold, Art knows exactly what his daddy needs: some delicious sick-fighting juice! After looking through the fridge and cupboards, they discover they're missing a key ingredient--ginger. But finding some ginger will take them downtown, to the farmers' market, to the food co-op, to the West African grocery ... to an unexpected encounter that brings everyone together, and results in a tasty celebration.
Author-illustrator Rob Liu-Trujillo's warm and vibrant watercolor illustrations are a celebration of mixed families and the many individuals who help make a neighborhood feel like a community. Fresh Juice is a delightful, kid- and community-centered picture book that will leave you thirsty for more!
Their Vicious Games
You must work twice as hard to get half as much.
Adina Walker has known this the entire time she's been on scholarship at the prestigious Edgewater Academy--a school for the rich (and mostly white) upper class of New England. It's why she works so hard to be perfect and above reproach, no matter what she must force beneath the surface. Even one slip can cost you everything.
And it does. One fight, one moment of lost control, leaves Adina blacklisted from her top choice Ivy League college and any other. Her only chance to regain the future she's sacrificed everything for is the Finish, a high-stakes contest sponsored by Edgewater's founding family in which twelve young, ambitious women with exceptional promise are selected to compete in three mysterious events: the Ride, the Raid, and the Royale. The winner will be granted entry into the fold of the Remington family, whose wealth and power can open any door.
But when she arrives at the Finish, Adina quickly gets the feeling that something isn't quite right with both the Remingtons and her competition, and soon it becomes clear that this larger-than-life prize can only come at an even greater cost. Because the Finish's stakes aren't just make or break...they're life and death.
Adina knows the deck is stacked against her--it always has been--so maybe the only way to survive their vicious games is for her to change the rules.
Chameleon: A Black Box Thriller
When a mysterious former South African commando, Lucas Van Groot, begins taking wealthy hostages all over the world, it appears at first to be a typical ransom gambit. However, it soon becomes clear that his "Hostage Inc." venture is manipulating worldwide stock markets and threatening global economic collapse
Enter Black Box, the CIA's elite, secret special operations branch--so surreptitious that not even the Director of CIA is fully privy to the unit's activities. Black Box is composed of highly skilled agents who perform with precision:
Chameleons who can transform into myriad characters, Ghosts who are specialists in stealth and surveillance, Wind operatives who are transportation experts, andAberration agents whose specialty is deep cover for years.
Kali Kent, a Nigerian born and Bronxite Chameleon in the Black Box program, leads the hunt for Van Groot. Tracking this ringleader and his cadre of international criminals, the team discovers the South African mastermind is after a much larger prize and the race is on to prevent a worldwide tragedy.
Along the way, Kali will have to face the demons from his childhood and reflect on his emotional path that made him the Chameleon that he is today.
Intermission
As glittering as their name, The Diamonds were on the brink of 1990s pop music stardom--until betrayal tore them apart. Now these four very different women are getting a second shot at success. But will reuniting mend their rift--or will lasting secrets, unspoken betrayals, new temptations, and the hard-knocks of today's music industry destroy them, and their dreams, for good?
Angel. Carmen. Doreen. Jade. Talented Memphis girls who had a brush with pop music fame--guided by Carmen's warm-hearted mother. But when she was elbowed out for a bigger manager, Carmen walked too. The bitter breakup shattered the Diamonds' never-easy "sisterhood" --and cost them the big-time.
Now a reunion offers a fresh start, just as mid-life struggles are pushing all four to the brink.
Angel hopes to reignite her failing solo career, but her insatiable ego keeps getting in the way. . . . Carmen was the group's peacemaker, but with her son in serious trouble, she's run out of patience. . . . Doreen longs to recapture the highs of performing, minus the drug haze--even as it risks her life as a pastor's wife. . . . And Jade, always the wallflower, is determined to get recognized this time around.
As the women contend with the new and overwhelming demands of celebrity, they find that the old traps have stayed the same. Can they ever reach true sisterhood--and help each other become the sparkling gems they were meant to be?
In Spite of the Consequences: Prison Letters on Exoneration, Abolition, and Freedom
Falsely convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison, Lacino Hamilton sent thousands of letters during his incarceration. After twenty-six years, including eleven years in solitary confinement, and a years-long campaign of public and political pressure, Hamilton was exonerated and released on September 30, 2020. The letters he wrote during his incarceration, advocating for his innocence--literally writing for his life--made him a leading voice on issues of abolition, imprisonment, and justice. Despite fierce resistance and retaliation from prison officials, he maintained correspondence with family and friends, as well as university professors and activists.
Tireless, empathetic, and unflinching, Hamilton's voice throughout these letters shines with immediacy. We must engage all people in recognizing the terrible costs of maintaining the US system of justice, he writes. In his passionate critiques of the prison-industrial complex, his emotional appeals to friends and family, and his fierce and unflagging defense of his own innocence, Hamilton exposes the oppressive, humiliating, and destructive reality of our justice system. From divestment in cities and policing policies to the everyday violence of imprisonment and its attempts to obliterate personhood in favor of obedience, these letters offer an incisive critique of our criminal justice system. We also feel Hamilton's deep generosity of spirit as he counsels others affected by this terrible system and lauds the work of those working on the outside for reform. With his voice, we sense something unexpected and profound: hope for a reimagining of our systems--a humanity-affirming model of justice.
An Unconditional Freedom: An Epic Love Story of the Civil War
The Civil War has turned neighbor against neighbor--but for the Cuban American daughter of an enslaved woman and a man ravaged by the horrors of slavery, an assassination plot could end the battle...
When the Union Army occupies the Florida home of Cuban Janeta Sanchez, daughter of an enslaved woman and the plantation owner who married her, her family's wealth does not protect her father from being imprisoned. Under duress and blaming herself for the arrest, Janeta agrees to infiltrate a group called the Loyal League as a double agent--and unexpectedly finds a cause truly worth the sacrifice.
Daniel Cumberland, born free in Massachusetts, studied law with dreams of helping his people--dreams that died the night he was kidnapped and sold into slavery. Daniel is rescued, but he's a changed man. When he's offered entry into the Loyal League, the covert organization of Black spies who helped free him, he seizes the opportunity for vengeance against the Confederacy and those who support it.
Daniel is aggravated by the headstrong and much too observant new detective he's paired with, while Janeta is intrigued by the broken but honorable man she is tasked with betraying. As they embark on a mission to intercept Jefferson Davis and thwart European meddling, their dual hidden agendas are threatened by the ghosts of their pasts and a growing affection that could strengthen both the Union and their souls--or lead to their downfall.
