KDL Recommends

NEWBERY J CURTIS

Ten-year-old Bud, a motherless boy living in Flint, Michigan, during the Great Depression, escapes a bad foster home and sets out in search of the man he believes to be his father—the renowned bandleader, H.E. Calloway of Grand Rapids.

HIST J CURTIS

In 1859, eleven-year-old Elijah Freeman, the first free-born child in Buxton, Canada, which is a haven for slaves fleeing the American south, uses his wits and skills to try to bring to justice the lying preacher who has stolen money that was to be used to buy a family’s freedom.

HIST TEEN DRAPER

Two fifteen-year-old girls—one a slave and the other an indentured servant—escape their Carolina plantation and try to make their way to Fort Moses, Florida, a Spanish colony that gives sanctuary to slaves.

TEEN DRAPER

Teenage Gerald, who has spent years protecting his fragile half-sister from their abusive father, faces the prospect of one final confrontation before the problem can be solved.

TEEN JOHNSON

Bobby’s carefree teenage life changes forever when he becomes a father and must care for his adored baby daughter.

TEEN JOHNSON

Fourteen-year-old Marley’s seemingly perfect life in the small town of Heaven is disrupted when she discovers that her father and mother are not her real parents.

HIST TEEN LESTER

A fictionalized account of the largest slave auction in U.S. history, held in Savannah, Georgia, in 1859.

TEEN MYERS

Seventeen-year-old Richie Perry, just out of his Harlem high school, enlists in the Army in the summer of 1967 and spends a devastating year on active duty in Vietnam.

TEEN MYERS

Sixteen-year-old “Slam” Harris is counting on his noteworthy basketball talents to get him out of the inner city and give him a chance to succeed in life, but his coach sees things differently.

SPORTS BASEBALL JNF NEL

Tells the story of Negro League baseball from its beginnings in the 1920s through the decline after Jackie Robinson crossed over to the majors in 1947.

BIOGRAPHY JNF REEVES

The life and times of Bass Reeves, the first African-American deputy U.S. marshal and the most successful in American history.

HISTORY US JNF PIN

Presents the stories of ten African-American men from different eras in American history, organized chronologically to provide a scope from slavery to the modern day.

TEEN TAYLOR

After the Civil War, Paul, the son of a white father and a black mother, finds himself caught between the two worlds of colored folks and white folks as he pursues his dream of owning land of his own.

HIST TEEN TAYLOR

Four black children growing up in rural Mississippi during the Depression experience racial antagonisms and hard times, but learn pride and self-respect from their parents.

J WILLIAMS-GARCIA

In 1968, three girls travel across the country to spend a month with the mother they barely know, but arrive to a cold welcome as they discover that their poet mother is resentful of the intrusion of their visit.