AALBC.com eNewsletter - December 20th, 2004

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1 - Some People, Some Other Place by J. California Cooper
2 - Chocolate Flava: The Eroticanoir.com Anthology - Zane (Editor)
3 - Getting Buck Wild: Sex Chronicles 2, Vol. 2 - Zane (Editor)
4 - The Sex Chronicles: Shattering the Myth by Zane
5 - , Said the Shotgun to the Head by Saul Williams

1 - Zero Debt: The Ultimate Guide to Financial Freedom by Lynnette Khalfani
2 - 'Twas the Night B'fore Christmas: An African-American Version - Retold by Melodye Rosales
3 - Black Students, Middle Class Teachers by Jawanza Kunjufu
4 - Holy Bible: Woman, Thou Art Loosed! Edition T. D. Jakes (Editor)
5 - A Call To Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King

Ray took us into darkness to better understand the soul in tragic circumstance, the soul that overcomes with pure determination because we see it is only determination that permits Ray to become a success; his persistence to control his destiny is clearly a lesson for any struggling human being, but especially the artist. We see the artist must not only master the show but the show business as well, and any moment he neglects show business he is ripe for robbery as happened in the beginning of his career and even later when he dismissed his assistant for stealing, but even more important is how Ray demanded rights to his music, including ownership of the master tapes. The movie is a how to for young artists.  Jamie Foxx did a masterful job as the blind Ray.
—Marvin X, was an important leader of the Black Arts Movement
 

The Womanizers by Dwayne S. Joseph - Reviewed by Thumper

How can I put this…The Womanizers by Dwayne S. Joseph could be classified as a literary “throwback”? Although the novel is not as wearable as a replica of an old St. Louis Raiders jersey; The Womanizers has the flavor of the novels written in the 80s, when Waiting to Exhale was being consider groundbreaking, E. Lynn Harris’ novels were quiet, guilty pleasures, and Eric Jerome Dickey had yet to claim his throne. It does not have the tight storyline, the lightening quick pace, or the entertaining characters of its predecessors.

Don’t Want No Sugar by J. D. Mason.

Everyone knew that Eula May had lost her mind over loving a married man. It was what drove her to kill herself and leave her only daughter, Roberta, in the care of the local mid-wife. So it was no wonder that Roberta became obsessed with Charles Harris the very first time she laid eyes on him. And she was willing to do whatever it took to make sure she was the only woman in his life. So when he is forced to marry her because of her unexpected pregnancy, Roberta feels that she has everything she ever wanted.

Women have always come easy to Charles, so he's wondering how he got saddled with a wife he doesn't love, two beautiful children and a longing for something grander. Then he meets the stunning Sara Tate and discovers a love almost as consuming as the one Roberta feels for him. This deadly love triangle will result in deception and murder, leaving a legacy for generations to come.
 

Angel of Harlem by Kuwana Hualsey
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0375508708/aalbccom-20

Inspired by the extraordinary events of Dr. May Chinn's  (1896–1980) life, Angel of Harlem is a deeply affecting story of love and transcendence. Weaving seamlessly scenes from the battlefields of the Civil War, during which her father escaped from slavery, to the Harlem living rooms and kitchen tables where May is sometimes forced to operate on her patients, this fascinating novel lays bare the heart of a woman who changed the face of medicine.

Alive with the pulse of black unrest in 1920s New York, this beautifully textured novel moves with fearlessness and grace through a history that is by turns ugly and sublime. With Angel of Harlem, critically acclaimed author Kuwana Haulsey gives poetic voice to the story of a remarkable woman who had the courage to dream and live beyond her era's limitations.
 

I Never Loved a Man the Way I Loved You: Aretha Franklin, Respect, and the Creation of a Soul Music Masterpiece by Matt Dobkin

"Dobkin gets seemingly every living soul responsible for Franklin's epoch-making album (save Aretha herself) to impart his or her perspective on its making. This involves much more than a track-by-track account of the recording sessions. Dobkin exuberantly, but never quite gushingly, relates Franklin's earlier life, other involvements, and the civil rights impact, for women as well as blacks, of the album's biggest hit, "Respect." A standout in the current crowd of classic-album histories." —Ray Olson, American Library Association.
 

Sleepaway School: Stories from a Boy's Life by Lee Stringer

The clash of being poor and black in an affluent, largely white New York suburb begins to foment pain and rage which erupts, more often than not, when he is at school. One violent episode results in his expulsion from the sixth grade and his subsequent three-year stint at Hawthorne, the "sleepaway school" of the title. What follows is an intensely personal American journey: a universal story of childhood where childhood universals are missing. Excluded at first by his peers, Stringer develops an outsider's eye, enabling him to see some things more deeply from without than from within. Such insight, however, is not enough to assuage the anguish he feels over his isolation. And when this spills out Stringer finds himself in yet another, darker institution.

Hickson

Hunger and passion drove HICKSON into becoming an entrepreneur-creating GHETTOHEAT™.on June 4th, 2003, focusing on self-publishing, distributing and marketing his own works; with intentions of publishing other talented authors. HICKSON's vision is to produce quality works, with his favorite subjects being his people-the inner-city voices of Ghetto-America.

Indiepen.com
http://www.indiepen.com

Indiepen.com is the premiere online destination for book lovers who want to read books about urban culture. We sell publications by self-published and independent authors only. Our book collection is one-of-a-kind, and includes literary works that cannot be found in commercial bookstores and retail chains. 

SistahsSupportingBlackAuthors Book Club

We are a dynamic, and diverse group of black women who share a common interest in reading and discussing novels that are about us, and by us. We have been meeting on a monthly basis since 1996; we are 15 members strong. Now you can review our discussions right here at the home of SistahsSupportingBlackAuthors. Bookmark this page and visit us each month for an exciting and new book discussion. Enjoy!

Just Like Me, Inc. is a Black owned children's media company dedicated to providing groundbreaking entertainment and fundamental education to improve the lives of all children, but especially Black children. Our company has a long history of inspiring and uplifting children. The company was started to achieve the goals of teaching the complete legacy of African American history and enhancing the development of children. We have created a series of children's books entitled Just Like Me that teaches the missing pieces of Black history and inspires your child to think about their own path in life. These books teach discoveries made by Black people that are never mentioned in most school textbooks like mathematics, the first college, medicine, 365-day calendar, ink and paper. We are currently working on the release of 6 new book titles, a cartoon series, and an animated fairytale movie.

A whopping 2,665 pages, The Norton Anthology of African American Literature was 10 years in the making, and it proves to have been well worth the wait. Beginning with vernacular forms such as the spirituals and the blues, it encompasses the whole history of black writing from the poems of Phillis Wheatley to the work of contemporary writers such as Terri McMillan, Toni Morrison, and Charles Johnson. Each section includes an introductory essay, and there is a brief biographical essay for each writer. The anthology includes an audio CD containing recorded examples of many of the songs and speeches.

Thoroughly Revised "Literature Since 1975" Succeeding the late Barbara Christian, new editor Cheryl A. Wall has included 5 new writers-poet Harryette Mullen and fiction writers Gayl Jones, Caryl Phillips, Edwidge Danticat, and Colson Whitehead. In addition, Wall has rewritten the period introduction and many headnotes in their entirety and updated all apparatus.

Between 1877 and 1930--years rife with tensions over citizenship, suffrage, immigration, and "the Negro problem"--African American activists promoted an array of strategies for progress and power built around "racial destiny," the idea that black Americans formed a collective whose future existence would be determined by the actions of its members. In Righteous Propagation, Michele Mitchell examines the reproductive implications of racial destiny, demonstrating how it forcefully linked particular visions of gender, conduct, and sexuality to collective well-being.

Mitchell argues that while African Americans did not agree on specific ways to bolster their collective prospects, ideas about racial destiny and progress generally shifted from outward-looking remedies such as emigration to inward-focused debates about intraracial relationships, thereby politicizing the most private aspects of black life and spurring race activists to calcify gender roles, monitor intraracial sexual practices, and promote moral purity. Examining the ideas of well-known elite reformers such as Mary Church Terrell and W. E. B. DuBois, as well as unknown members of the working and aspiring classes, such as James Dubose and Josie Briggs Hall, Mitchell reinterprets black protest and politics and recasts the way we think about black sexuality and progress after Reconstruction.

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