Showing results by narrator "JD Jackson" in All Categories

One of Buzzfeed’s Most Anticipated Books of 2021. “This trailblazing work of fiction is notable for its depiction of Harlem’s African American society and culture in the 1930s” –Bookpage When the body of N’Gana Frimbo, the African conjure-man, is discovered in his consultation room...

Langston Brown is running out of time and options for clearing his name and escaping death row. Wrongfully convicted of the gruesome Mother's Day Massacre, he prepares to face his death. His final hope for salvation lies with his daughter, Liza, an artist who dreamed of a life of music and song but left the prestigious Juilliard School to pursue a law degree with the intention of clearing her father's name.

Across America, the pure love and popularity of barbecue cookery have gone through the roof. Prepared in one regional style or another, in the South and beyond, barbecue is one of the nation's most distinctive culinary arts. And people aren't just eating it; they're also reading books and articles and watching TV shows about it. But why is it, asks Adrian Miller - admitted 'cuehead and longtime certified barbecue judge - that in today's barbecue culture, African Americans don't get much love?

The last scion of a once-powerful political family, Worcester mayor John O'Toole has his sights set on vastly higher aspirations. When night-shift paramedic Thomas Archer uncovers a secret that could upend the mayor's career, O'Toole is set on silencing him and sends Eamon Conroy, a brutal former cop, to ensure the truth remains under wraps.

In this new and expanded edition of Nelson George's classic cultural study, contemporary Black culture is chronicled through essays on music, film, sports, publishing, politics, and city life, both uptown and down. Buppies enter nearly every arena of the Black urban USA: roisterous rappers and legendary hoopsters, streetwise hustlers and influential filmmakers, unsung musicians and drug dealers at work.

Links the history of race relations to the history of basketball by reviewing the era of the first Black teams, the first integration of teams, and the innovations that Black players have brought to the game.

Through a series of heart-breaking and poignant letters, come explore the 20-year journey of a child longing for the love of his mentally ill mother while facing seemingly insurmountable odds. Witness Manny's transformation in this coming of age story of a forgotten and disfigured child, born into spirit-crushing poverty in Houston, Texas, and thrust into adulthood all too soon. Crying out to the world for understanding and forgiveness, Manny battles the silent and treacherous enemy of mental illness in his mother's often erratic and sometimes terrifying behavior.

An examination of African American imagery and participation in American movies includes a timeline of important African American events in film history and discusses the achievements of noted celebrities.

In this new collection of short stories, vignettes, and autobiographical sketches - many previously unpublished - Charles Willeford, author of Miami Blues and The Burnt Orange Heresy creates a mosaic of the absurdities of life in the 20th century. From a malicious grandmother to prophetic depictions of the power of reality television, with his wry humor and sudden shifts to violence, he seduces, amuses, and repeatedly surprises you.

Nicknamed Dewey Decimal for his obsessive attempts to bring order to the New York Public Library in the wake of disastrous events in the city, the hero of this series earns his keep as a bagman and enforcer for unscrupulous politicians and underworld figures. Now, he’s stumbled upon information concerning the gruesome murder of a prostitute that involves a prominent US senator - and finds himself chasing ghosts and fighting for his life, pursued by private military contractors and the ever-present specter of his own past....

Dubbed “Dewey Decimal” for his desire to reorganize the library’s stock, he gets by as bagman and muscle for New York City’s unscrupulous district attorney. He takes no pleasure in this kind of civic dirty work. He’d be perfectly content alone among his books. But this is not in the cards, as the DA calls on Dewey for a seemingly straightforward union-busting job.

The man known as Dewey Decimal works in a near-future Manhattan decimated by terrorism and plague, running dirty operations for the crooked Senator Howard - though he’d prefer to spend his time among the stacks at his beloved New York Public Library. When Dewey is tasked with disrupting unrest from a growing group of outcast civilians, and simultaneously given the assignment of protecting a pair of Saudi royals, he is forced to look within and make some impossible choices - and it will put him at odds with his benefactor and the powers that be....

Some locales seem to come with their own soundtrack. Don Ho and his tiny bubbles provide the background music for Hawaii, Edith Piaf for Paris. The reggae of Bob Marley evokes Jamaica. The soundtrack for Alabama is without question provided by our troubled troubadour Hank Williams. The 2016 biography Hank by Mark Ribowsky paints a dark picture of the musician's short, alcoholic, drug-filled life: a life of loneliness and pain. He goes so far as to call Hank's life story "noir-ish"....

It's been a thousand years since the Rising. Earth is a wasteland, and a holy order of knights is all that stands between what remains of civilization and the brigands and demons trying to bring it all down. When the oldest of these knights, Abe, isn't trying to keep his brothers in line, he's tirelessly attempting to decode the riddles that have guided the Knights Eternal for the past two centuries. The visions Abe's been having aren't helping matters.

Thursday Night Lights tells the inspiring, largely unknown story of African American high school football in Texas. Drawing on interviews, newspaper stories, and memorabilia, Michael Hurd introduces the players, coaches, schools, and towns where African Americans built powerhouse football programs under the PVIL leadership. He covers 50 years (1920-1970) of high school football history.

A family emergency brings former rapper and current real estate mogul Ivan Spencer back to his long-abandoned hometown. While there, he must deal with his confused mother, his elderly, philandering father, his flaky sister, an unreliable aunt, and a face from the past who makes him question some of his earlier decisions. All he wants to do is to get things squared away and return to his life, but as it turns out, he must deal with his own issues first.

More than 150 years after the end of the Civil War, scores of websites, articles, and organizations repeat claims that anywhere between 500 and 100,000 free and enslaved African Americans fought willingly as soldiers in the Confederate army. But as Kevin M. Levin argues in this carefully researched book, such claims would have shocked anyone who served in the army during the war itself. Levin explains that imprecise contemporary accounts, poorly understood primary-source material, and other misrepresentations helped fuel the rise of the black Confederate myth.

From the pulpy pages of Black Mask Magazine in the 1920s and '30s, through the film noir era of the 1940s, to today, noir fiction has lured many a reader and movie-goer away from the light and into the dark underbelly of society. Names such as Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and James M. Cain; titles like The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, The Postman Always Rings Twice...these have inhabited our collective consciousness for decades. Humanity, it seems, loves the dark. And within the dark, one figure stands out: that of the femme fatale.

A must-have for football fans of all ages, this handsomely designed gift book is a comprehensive audio guide to the greatest traditions and rivalries in college football. Every Saturday each fall, millions of Americans watch their favorite college teams take to the gridiron, battling to make it...

At the age of nine, Issac J. Bailey saw his hero, his eldest brother, taken away in handcuffs, not to return from prison for thirty-two years. Bailey tells the story of their relationship and of his experience living in a family suffering guilt and shame. Drawing on sociological research as well as his expertise as a journalist, he seeks to answer the crucial question of why Moochie and many other young black men - including half of the ten boys in his own family - end up in the criminal justice system. What role did poverty, race, and faith play? What effect did living in the South, in the Bible Belt, have?