First published in 1930, "Not Without Laughter" is the debut novel by Langston Hughes and a deeply personal, semi-autobiographical tale of an African-American family in rural Kansas. Langston Hughes, born in 1902 in Joplin, Missouri, spent much of his youth in Lawrence, Kansas and it is here that he set his first novel. "Not Without Laughter" tells the story of young Sandy Rogers as he grows from a boy to a young man and focuses on his "awakening...

First published in 1928, "Quicksand" is the first novel by American author Nella Larsen. It is the semi-autobiographical tale of a young, mixed race woman who struggles to find her place in the world. Like her main character, Helga Crane, Larsen was the daughter of a Danish white mother and a West Indian black father who disappeared from her life as a baby. Larsen and the fictional Crane never feel that they belong in either the white world or the...

Early in his career, Eugene O'Neill (1888–1953) wrote a series of plays revolving around characters obsessed with the sea. This period culminated in the 1922 production of Anna Christie, a Pulitzer Prize–winning drama of social realism that was among the first of the author's plays to explore characters searching for their own identities. Centering on the reunion of a barge captain and his daughter after a twenty-year separation, the play derives...

When two young people are given a life-changing opportunity, they encounter moral and systemic challenges that are directly tied to their racial and economic backgrounds. In The Quest of the Silver Fleece, W.E.B. Du Bois confronts covert discrimination in contemporary America. Cotton, also known as "silver fleece," is still a prized possession in the early-twentieth century. It continues to generate massive profits that are barely distributed amongst...

NAACP nominee and bestselling author Beverly Jenkins returns to the charming town of Henry Adams, Kansas-a place that always feels like home-in this heartwarming story of family, friendship, and the surprises hidden in our lives. Henry Adams has had its fair share of drama ever since Bernadine Brown bought the town with her divorce settlement. Now just when things are starting to settle down, it's about to get crazy again . . . Cephas Patterson doesn't...

Almost two years had passed since the discovery of retired baseball player Royale Jones' real identity: Rolondo Jemison. Valerie Rollins, famous Gossip Columnist, never revealed her intimate past with the true Wildcat player. While she and her crime-solving partner Rome Nyland were behind the uncovering of this imposter, one infamous question lingered on: what happened to the real Royale? As if the heavens themselves intervened, a peculiar stranger...

"When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his 'proper place' and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit. His education makes it necessary." Overcoming extreme poverty, racism, and other adversities Carter Godwin...

Alexis Fletcher hasn't had a merry Christmas in five years-not since her mother passed away. Every December she remembers the joy her mother brought to everyone during the holiday season and feels the pain of her absence, even more so now that she and her sister are barely speaking. More than anything, Alexis wishes her family could be whole again. However, with her wedding fast approaching, Alexis might just be ready to make some holiday memories...

"Nothing short of astonishing. The best writers are brave writers, and Harris has proven herself among those ranks." —Mateo Askaripour, New York Times bestselling author of Black Buck

A compelling debut that glows with bittersweet heart and touching emotion, deeply interrogating questions of family, redemption, and unconditional love in the sweltering summer heat of Savannah, as two people discover what it means

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Nella Larsen was an important writer associated with the Harlem Renaissance. While she was not prolific, her work was powerful and critically acclaimed. Collected here are both, of her novels, 'Passing' and 'Quicksand'. 'Quicksand', was autobiographical in nature and examined a woman's need for sexual fulfilment balanced against respectability and acceptance amid a deeply religious society. The novel is deeply pessimistic and ends as the protagonist...