Six short works include the stories of a couple who become estranged after a mysterious man claims he grew up in their house, and a Russian bus boy who is entangled with an organized crime ring.

"For a runaway slave in the 1840s south, life on the run can be just as dangerous as life under a sadistic Massa. That's what fifteen-year-old Naomi learns after she escapes the brutal confines of life on an Alabama plantation. Striking out on her own, she must leave behind her beloved Momma and sister Hazel and take refuge in a Georgia brothel run by a freewheeling, gun-toting Jewish madam named Cynthia. There, amidst a revolving door of gamblers,...

Mississippi plantation mistress Amanda Satterfield loses her daughter to cholera after her husband refuses to treat her for what he considers to be a "slave disease." Insane with grief, Amanda takes a newborn slave child as her own and names her Granada, much to the outrage of her husband and the amusement of their white neighbors. Seventy-five years later, Granada, now known as Gran Gran, is still living on the plantation and must revive the buried...

"Cassandra Williams is twelve, and her little brother Wayne is seven. One day, when they're alone together, an accident happens and Wayne is lost forever. Or so it seems. Though his body is never recovered, their mother, unable to give up hope, launches an organization dedicated to missing children. Their father simply leaves, starts another family somewhere else. As C grows older, she sees her brother everywhere: in coffee shops, airplane aisles,...

Feeling adrift after ending a relationship, Julius, a young Nigerian doctor living in New York, takes long walks through the city while listening to the stories of fellow immigrants until a shattering truth is revealed.

In this scorching, mournful, often explicit, and never-less-than-moving literary novel from Walter Mosley, acclaimed creator of the Easy Rawlins series, Debbie Dare has to come to terms with her sordid life in the adult-entertainment industry. Millions of men (and, no doubt, many women) have watched the famed black porn queen-she of the blond wig and blue contact lenses-'do it' on television and computer screens every which way and with every combination...

"When Epic's family moves to a new neighborhood, he has a hard time making friends and fitting in with his skateboard; but the trick to making new friends is to be yourself!"--

"The epic rendering of a Black woman's journey through slavery and liberation, set in 17th-century colonial Brazil. "Palmares" recounts the journey of Almeyda, a Black slave girl who comes of age on Portuguese plantations and escapes to a fugitive slave settlement called Palmares. Following its destruction, Almeyda embarks on a journey across colonial Brazil to find her husband lost in battle. Her story brings to life a world impacted by greed, conquest,...

Picks up fifteen years after "Waiting to Exhale" to find Savannah contemplating divorce, Bernadine addicted to painkillers after a second husband's swindle, Robin a shopaholic, and Gloria confronting profound change.

"In a near-future Southern city, everyone is talking about a new experimental medical procedure that boasts unprecedented success rates. In a society plagued by racism, segregation, and private prisons, this operation saves lives with a controversial method--by turning people white. Like any father, our unnamed narrator just wants the best for his son Nigel, a biracial boy whose black birthmark is getting bigger by the day. But in order to afford...