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Black History Month Booklist

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maroon background with gray geometric design with text 'Black History Month books by black authors for all ages'
February 1, 2021

February is Black History Month! We've compiled a booklist for all ages to help celebrate the importance of black history and of the contributions of African Americans to our history and culture.

Click on a title to find it in our catalog; and find many more titles at cobbcat.org.

Children's Picture Books

Bedtime Bonnet by Nancy Amanda Redd

Black is a Rainbow Color by Angela Joy

Daddy Calls Me Man by Angela Johnson

Firebird: Ballerina Misty Copeland Shows a Young Girl How to Dance Like the Firebird by Misty Copeland

Hair Love by Matthew Cherry

Happy to be Nappy by bell hooks

Henry’s Freedom Box by Ellen Levine

Mixed Me by Taye Diggs

Sulwe by Lupita Nyong'o

Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold

Children's Nonfiction

Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life by Ashley Bryan

Hidden Figures: The True Story of Four Black Women and the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly

I Am Loved by Nikki Giovanni

Let the Children March by Monica Clark-Robinson

Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History by Vashti Harrison

Little Legends: Exceptional Men in Black History by Vashti Harrison

Mufaro's Beautiful Daughters by John Steptoe

One Last Word: Wisdom from the Harlem Renaissance by Nikk Grimes

The Palm of My Heart: Poetry by African American Children by Davida Adedjouma

Schomburg: The Man Who Built a Library by Carole Boston Weatherford

Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up by Sitting Down by Andrea Davis Pinkney

The Undefeated by Kwame Alexander

Children's and Preteen Chapter Books

A Good Kind of Trouble by Lisa Moore Ramée

Blended by Sharon M. Draper

Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams

Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes

Ghost by Jason Reynolds

Hurricane Child by Kacen Callender

New Kid by Jerry Craft

One Crazy Summer by Rita Garcia-Williams

The Watsons Go to Birmingham by Christopher Paul Curtis

Books for Teens and Young Adults

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi

Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo

Dear Martin by Nic Stone

Let Me Hear a Rhyme by Tiffany D. Jackson

March by John Lewis

Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi

Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

Stamped by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson

Adult Fiction

Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi

Gingerbread by Helen Oyeyemi

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

Kindred by Octavia Butler

Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson

Adult Nonfiction

Becoming by Michelle Obama

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Black Futures edited by Kimberly Drew

Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin

How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi

How We Fight for Our Lives by Saeed Jones

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown

We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The Yellow House by Sarah Broom