Top African-American fiction
Explore the best African-American fiction books with our curated list of top novels. Discover powerful stories, acclaimed authors, and must-read titles in Black literature today.
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Unburnable
by Marie-Elena John
Set partly in contemporary Washington, D.C., and post-World War II Dominica, this debut novel deftly intertwines the cultures of blacks in the United States and the West Indies as an extraordinary multigenerational family saga unfolds.
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Leaving Atlanta
by Tayari Jones
An award-winning author makes her fiction debut with this coming-of-age story of three young black children set against the backdrop of the Atlanta child murders of 1979.
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Joplin's Ghost
by Tananarive Due
When Phoenix Smalls was ten, she nearly died at her parents' jazz club when she was crushed by a turn-of-the-century piano. Now twenty-four, Phoenix is launching a career as an R & B singer. She's living out her dreams and seems destined for fame and fortune. But a chance visit to a historical site in St. Louis ignites a series of bizarre, erotic encounters with a spirit who may be the King of Ragtime, Scott Joplin. The sound of Scott Joplin is strange enough to the ears of the hip-hop generation. But the idea that these antique sounds are being channeled through Phoenix? Her life is suddenly hanging in the balance. How will she find her true voice and calling? Can the power of her own inner song give Phoenix the strength to fight to live out her own future? Or will she be forever trapped in Scott Joplin's doomed, tragic past? Stunningly original, Joplin's Ghost is a novel filled with art and intrigue -- and is sure to bring music to readers' ears.
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Half of a Yellow Sun
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Re-creates the 1960s struggle of Biafra to establish an independent republic in Nigeria, following the intertwined lives of the characters through a military coup, the Biafran secession, and the resulting civil war.
