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What have we here? : portraits of a life / by Williams, Billy Dee,1937-author.;
In 'What Have We Here?', film legend Billy Dee Williams recalls his remarkable life of nearly eight decades-a heralded actor who's played the roles he wanted, from 'Brian's Song' to Lando in the 'Star Wars' universe-unchecked by the racism and typecasting so rife in the mostly all-white industry in which he triumphed. In this intimate, joyful, and inspiring memoir, Williams reflects on his love of painting; his love of women; his full embrace of life; on being a husband and father; and on all that has sustained and carried him through a lifetime of dreams and adventure.
Subjects: Biographies.; Autobiographies.; Williams, Billy Dee, 1937-; African American actors;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Entitlement [text (large print)] / by Alam, Rumaan,author.;
"Brooke Orr is on a mission to change her life and the world. Assisting an octogenarian billionaire in the quest to give away his vast fortune turns out to be deeply satisfying work, a noble life path. All you need to make the world a better place, it turns out, is the right ideals with the right amount of money. She and her billionaire make an uncommon pair: Brooke, 33, is a Black woman raised by a single mother in New York City; Asher Jaffee, 83, is a white business tycoon with an elaborate lifestyle. Each is exhilarated by the new friendship. Asher loves Brooke's willingness to spar with him, and Brooke finds her proximity to Asher's power intoxicating, even mind altering. As limits are increasingly pushed and unusual boundaries crossed, the line between need and want blurs dramatically."--
Subjects: Large print books.; Psychological fiction.; Novels.; African American women; Billionaires; Charitable uses, trusts, and foundations; Charity organization; Desire; Entitlement attitudes; Interpersonal relations; Privilege (Social psychology); Rich people; Social classes; Wealth;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Recitatif : a story / by Morrison, Toni,author.; Smith, Zadie,writer of introduction.;
Includes bibliographical references."In this 1983 short story--the only short story Morrison ever wrote--we meet Twyla and Roberta, who have known each other since they were eight years old and spent four months together as roommates in St. Bonaventure shelter. Inseparable then, they lose touch as they grow older, only later to find each other again at a diner, a grocery store, and again at a protest. Seemingly at opposite ends of every problem, and at each other's throats each time they meet, the two women still cannot deny the deep bond their shared experience has forged between them. Another work of genius by this masterly writer, Recitatif keeps Twyla's and Roberta's races ambiguous throughout the story. Morrison herself described Recitatif, a story which will keep readers thinking and discussing for years to come, as "an experiment in the removal of all racial codes from a narrative about two characters of different races for whom racial identity is crucial." We know that one is white and one is Black, but which is which? And who is right about the race of the woman the girls tormented at the orphanage? A remarkable look into what keeps us together and what keeps us apart, and how perceptions are made tangible by reality, Recitatif is a gift to readers in these changing times"--
Subjects: Short stories.; African American women; African Americans; Female friendship; Interpersonal relations; Interracial friendship; Whites; Women, White;
Available copies: 2 / Total copies: 2
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Didn't nobody give a shit what happened to Carlotta / by Hannaham, James,author.;
'Didn't Nobody Give a Shit What Happened to Carlotta' is the raucous, irreverent, and harrowing story of a trans womans re-entry into life on the outside after more than 20 years in a men's prison, set over one eventful Fourth of July weekend in Brooklyn. From the author of 'Delicious Foods', which won the PEN/Faulkner Award and was a NYT Notable Book. #diversity.
Subjects: Psychological fiction.; Transgender fiction.; Novels.; African Americans; Ex-convicts; Families; Parolees; Prisoners; Transgender women;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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We lie here / by Hall, Rachel Howzell,author.;
"TV writer Yara Gibson's hometown of Palmdale, California, isn't her first choice for a vacation. But she's back to host her parents' twentieth-anniversary party and find the perfect family mementos for the celebration. Everything is going to plan until Yara receives a disturbing text: I have information that will change your life. The message is from Felicia Campbell, who claims to be a childhood friend of Yara's mother. But they've been estranged for years-- drama best ignored and forgotten. But Yara can't forget Felicia, who keeps texting, insisting that Yara talk to her 'before it's too late.' But the next day is already too late for Felicia, whose body is found floating in Lake Palmdale. Before she died, Felicia left Yara a key to a remote lakeside cabin. In the basement are files related to a mysterious tragedy, unsolved since 1998. What secrets was Felicia hiding? How much of what Yara knows about her family has been true? The deeper Yara digs for answers, the more she fears that Felicia was right. Uncovering the truth about what happened at the cabin all those years ago will change Yara's life-- or end it." -- Dust jacket flap.
Subjects: Thrillers (Fiction); Novels.; African American women; Death; Family secrets;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Hold my girl : a novel / by Carr, Charlene,author.;
"A heart-wrenching novel about two women whose eggs are switched during IVF. Katherine is a woman full of obsessions. Everything clean, everything perfect, all the time. After seven years of trying--and failing--to conceive, she finally gives birth to Rose, her IVF miracle child. But she's afraid that Rose may not be her daughter; her pale skin doesn't match Katherine's own. Tess never got her happy ending. She took on IVF alongside Katherine and a group of hopeful mothers, but her daughter, Hanna, was stillborn. After a series of poor choices, she's divorced, broke and stuck in a job that's below her skill set. Ten months later, Katherine and Tess get a call from the fertility clinic that reveals shocking news: the two women's eggs were switched. While Katherine's perfect life beings to crumble around her, for Tess it's the glimmer of hope she needs to get her life back on track. But it will take a custody battle to decide who deserves to be Rose's mother, a battle that will push both women to the brink. With themes of racial identity, loss and betrayal, this emotional novel centred around a difficult moral question beautifully explores the complexities of motherhood."--
Subjects: Domestic fiction.; Psychological fiction.; Novels.; African American women; Custody of children; Families; Fertilization in vitro, Human; Infertility; Women;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Wolf hustle : a Black woman on Wall Street / by Fabré, Cin,author.;
"Growing up, Cin Fabrae didn't know anything about the stock market. But she learned how to hustle from her immigrant parents, saving money so that one day she could escape her abusive father and poverty in the Bronx. Through a tip from a friend, Cin pushed her way into brokerage firm VTR Capital-an offshoot of Stratton Oakmont, the company where the Wolf of Wall Street, Jordan Belfort, had reigned. She was shocked to find an army of young, mostly Black and Brown, workers with no real prospects for promotion sitting at phones doing the drudge work of finding investment leads for white male brokers. But she felt the pull of profit and knew she would do whatever she had to do to be successful. Pulling back the curtain on the inequities she and so many others faced, Wolf Hustle reveals how Cin worked grueling hours, ascending from cold caller to stockbroker to become the only Black woman to do so at her firm. She also discloses the excesses she took part in on 1990s Wall Street-the strip clubs, the Hamptons parties, the Gucci shopping sprees-while reveling in the thrill of making money. From landing clients worth hundreds of millions to gaining, losing, then gaining back fortunes in seconds, Cin examines her years spent trading frantically and hustling successfully, grappling with what it takes to build a rich life, and, ultimately, beating Wall Street at its own game"--
Subjects: Biographies.; Autobiographies.; Fabré, Cin.; African American investment advisors; African American women; Securities industry; Women stockbrokers;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The last dreamwalker / by Woods, Rita,author.;
"From Hurston/Wright Legacy Award-winning author Rita Woods, The Last Dreamwalker tells the story of two women, separated by nearly two centuries yet inextricably linked by the Gullah Geechee Islands off the coast of South Carolina-and their connection toa mysterious and extraordinary gift passed from generation to generation. In the wake of her mother's passing, Layla Hurley unexpectedly reconnects with her mother's sisters, women she hasn't been allowed to speak to, or of, in years. Her aunts reveal toLayla that a Gullah-Geechee island off the shore of South Carolina now belongs to her. As Layla digs deeper into her mother's past and the mysterious island's history, she discovers that the terrifying nightmares that have plagued her throughout her lifeand tainted her relationship with her mother and all of her family, is actually a power passed down through generations of her Gullah ancestors. She is a Dreamwalker, able to inhabit the dreams of others-and to manipulate them. As Layla uncovers increasingly dark secrets about her family's past, she finds herself thrust into the center of a potentially deadly, decades-old feud fought in the dark corridor of dreams. The Last Dreamwalker is a gripping, contemporary read about power and agency; family and legacy; and the ways trauma, secrets, and magic take shape across generations"--
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Magic realist fiction.; Novels.; African American women; Dreams; Family secrets; Islands;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Savvy Sheldon feels good as hell / by McCoy, Taj,author.;
Savvy Sheldon spends a lot of time tiptoeing around the cracks in her life: her high-stress and low-thanks job, her clueless boyfriend and the falling-apart kitchen she inherited from her beloved grandma--who taught her how to cook and how to love people by feeding them. But when Savvy's world starts to crash down around her, she knows it's time for some renovations. Starting from the outside in, Savvy tackles her crumbling kitchen, her relationship with her body, her work-life balance (or lack thereof) and, last but not least, her love life. The only thing that doesn't seem to require effort is her ride-or-die squad of friends. But as any home-reno-show junkie can tell you, something always falls apart during renovations. First, Savvy passes out during hot yoga. Then it turns out that the contractor she hires is the same sexy stranger she unintentionally offended by judging based on appearances. Worst of all, Savvy can't seem to go anywhere without tripping over her ex and his latest "upgrade." Savvy begins to realize that maybe she should've started her renovations the other way around: beginning with how she sees herself before building a love that lasts.
Subjects: Romance fiction.; Novels.; African American women; Dwellings; Female friendship; Man-woman relationships; Overweight women; Self-esteem in women;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Luster / by Leilani, Raven,author.;
"Sharp, comic, disruptive, tender, Raven Leilani's debut novel, Luster, sees a young black woman fall into art and someone else's open marriage. Edie is stumbling her way through her twenties--sharing a subpar apartment in Bushwick, clocking in and out of her admin job, making a series of inappropriate sexual choices. She's also, secretly, haltingly, figuring her way into life as an artist. And then she meets Eric, a digital archivist with a family in New Jersey, including an autopsist wife who has agreed to an open marriage--with rules. As if navigating the constantly shifting landscapes of contemporary sexual manners and racial politics weren't hard enough, Edie finds herself unemployed and falling into Eric's family life, his home. She becomes a hesitant friend to his wife and a de facto role model to his adopted daughter. Edie is the only black woman who young Akila knows. Razor sharp, darkly comic, sexually charged, socially disruptive, Luster is a portrait of a young woman trying to make sense of her life in a tumultuous era. It is also a haunting, aching description of how hard it is to believe in your own talent and the unexpected influences that bring us into ourselves along the way."--
Subjects: Novels.; Novels.; Triangles (Interpersonal relations); Young women; African American women artists; Adopted children; Domestic fiction.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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