Beyoncé Gets In Formation for Information

Beyoncé is getting all the ladies in formation for information! In that vein, we'd like to recommend the following 20 recently published books by and about African-Americans. (We know we're leaving out classics like The Souls of Black Folk and The Mis-Education of the Negro, or even Black Boy and Coming of Age in Mississippi. We decided to stick with books published in the last ten years in order to keep the list at manageable length.)

• The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
  Michelle Alexander
• Buck: A Memoir
  M.K. Asante 
• Nat Turner
  Kyle Baker
• Sentences: The Life of M.F. Grimm
  Percy Carey
  
• Between the World and Me
  Ta-Nehisi Coates
• Bad Feminist: Essays
  Roxane Gay
• Strange Fruit: Uncelebrated Moments from Black History
  Joel Christian Gill
• The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace: A Brilliant Young Man Who Left Newark for the Ivy League
  Jeff Hobbs
• Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America
  Gilbert King
• How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America
  Kiese Laymon
• Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America
  Jill Leovy
• March: Book One
  John Lewis
• F.B. Eyes: How J. Edgar Hoover's Ghostreaders Framed African American Literature
  William J. Maxwell
• Citizen: An American Lyric
  Claudia Rankine
• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
  Rebecca Skloot
• Ordinary Light
  Tracy K. Smith
• Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
  Bryan Stevenson
• Native Guard
  Natasha Trethewey
• We Will Shoot Back: Armed Resistance in the Mississippi Freedom Movement
  Akinyele Omowale Umoja
• Men We Reaped: A Memoir
  Jessmyn Ward

What would you add to this list? Let us know in the comments. Until next time, informative and happy reading!

MLC Reads: November 6, 2015

We do so love to read! We just love to curl up in a nice spot, pull out a good book, and lose ourselves in the printed word. We've spent the last week reading these wonderful books:

 Freedom Summer

written by Deborah Wiles

illustrated by Jerome Lagarrigue

picture book

five stars

Freedom Summer is picture book perfection. Jerome Lagarrigue won the John Steptoe Award for New Talent for his illustrations and we can see why. The gorgeous impressionism-inspired pictures pulled us even deeper into this story of the South during the summer of 1964. Deborah Wiles's tale of young Joe and John Henry's friendship is incredibly sweet. Joe, who is white, is noticing the ugly side of the segregated world in which he grew up for the first time. He wants his friend John Henry to be able to experience all the same fun things he does in their small town. The ways in which the two small boys act and react to their town's fight against integration is both heartbreaking and inspiring. This is a must read for pre-schoolers and up.

The Truth About Alice

written by Jennifer Mathieu

YA fiction

five stars

If you've ever attended school with a bunch typical teenagers- hellooo, high school- this book will be a trip down memory lane. If you're still in high school, you may recognize yourself or your friends on these pages. The stories and accusations flying around Alice are shocking, but the untold stories hiding in this high school are equally fascinating. Told from multiple points of view, this short novel is a reflection on stereotypes that will keep you on the edge of your seat to the very end.

Uprooted

written by Naomi Novik

YA fantasy

four stars

Uprooted by Naomi Novik follows the story of young Agnieszka. Every ten years the Dragon, a powerful wizard who defends her village from the corrupting influences of the Wood, comes to Agnieszka’s village and chooses a young woman to take with him. The Dragon inexplicably chooses Agnieszka over her best friend Kasia, who possesses all the charm, beauty and poise Agnieszka does not. Thus begins a story of adventure, loss, friendship, and love. Uprooted is lighthearted and humorous at times but there is also a sense of tragedy and loss that underscores it. While there is a romantic undercurrent to the story, the real relationship at the heart of this book is the honest and moving friendship between Agnieszka and her best friend Kasia.

Meanwhile There Are Letters: The Correspondence of Eudora Welty and Ross Macdonald

edited by Suzanne Marrs and Tom Nolan

nonfiction: letters

three stars

Lovely letters by two master story tellers... From time to time it plodded a bit, but the commentary by Suzanne Mars and Tom Nolan made this a fairly fascinating peek into the lives of Eudora Welty and Kenneth Millar. If you haven't already, be sure to pick up What There Is to Say We Have Said: The Correspondence of Eudora Welty and William Maxwell. (Ms. Eudora knew how to write a right fine letter!)

Next week, we have these books on our plate:

• Mister B. Gone
  written by Clive Barker
• Lois Lane: Fallout
  written by Gwenda Bond
• This Is Not My Hat
  written by Jon Klassen
• Mississippi Moonshine Politics: How Bootleggers & the Law Kept a Dry State Soaked
  written by Janice Branch Tracy
  
  Until then, happy reading!

Remembering Mary Church Terrell

Mary Eliza Church Terrell was born on this day, September 23, in 1863. When she was only six, her parents sent her from their home in Memphis, Tennessee, to Ohio, so that she might obtain a quality education, which was not available in her home state. She went on to achieve many things that were thought to be impossible for someone of her sex and color at that time:

• She secured not only a college degree, but also her master's degree (in 1885.)
• In 1896, with the help of women like Harriet Tubman and Ida Bell Wells-Barnett, Terrell co-founded the National Association of Colored Women by merging two women's groups for African-Americans. She served as president three times.
• Terrell was an avid suffragette, as well as a proponent of racial equality. She was a founding member of the National Association of the Advancement of Colored People in 1909.
• She passed away July 24, 1954, in Annapolis, Maryland.

One excellent resource for this remarkable woman comes from the Library of Congress. Click the link to find a plethora of resources about Mary Church Terrell. If you're looking for print sources, try her autobiography, A Colored Woman in a White World, or the juvenile biography, Fight On! Mary Church Terrell's Battle for Integration.

We leave you with these words from a speech she gave to the National American Women's Suffrage Association in 1898:

And so, lifting as we climb, onward and upward we go, struggling and striving, and hoping that the buds and blossoms of our desires will burst into glorious fruition ere long. With courage, born of success achieved in the past, with a keen sense of the responsibility which we shall continue to assume, we look forward to a future large with promise and hope. Seeking no favors because of our color, nor patronage because of our needs, we knock at the bar of justice, asking an equal chance.

MLC Reads: August 28, 2015

Oh, the books! The siren call of the printed page! (Or the eReader...)

The Other Typist

Suzanne Rindell

four stars

Set in America in the 1920s when liquor was illegal and women were bobbing their hair, we meet Rose. Rose is a typist in a police precinct; her life is boring and predictable until the other typist is hired. Rose's life soon changes! Hold onto your hats for a gin-drinking, women-smoking, and speakeasy good time. But be cautious... what you're reading may very well not be entirely the complete truth. (After finishing this book, we're still scratching our heads over all the plausible plots.) Something to look forward to when you finish reading The Other Typist: the film rights have already been purchased.

Mississippi Trial, 1955
written by Chris Crowe
five stars

Mississippi Trial, 1955 is a strong introduction for middle schoolers to the civil rights era in Mississippi. Although the book's centers around a young white protagonist, the tragic story of Emmett Till is told in a way that pre-teens can grasp. Chris Crowe has a pretty way with words, too. One of our favorite quotes from the book was,

"Maybe God put different kinds of people on earth so we could all learn to get along."

Highly recommended, especially with a group discussion.

 Nimona

written and illustrated by Noelle Stevenson

five stars

Nimona is a terrific graphic novel! Nimona is a young shapeshifter looking to join forces with villainous Lord Ballister Blackheart. A twist of fate marks the unlikely pair as heroes. Witty dialog and vibrant illustrations entertained us from beginning to end. We can't wait to read more by Noelle Stevenson. (Lumberjanes is on our radar!)

The Lion & the Mouse

written and illustrated
by Jerry Pinkney

five stars

Jerry Pinkney, an incredible artist, takes on Aesop's fable about a lion and a mouse. This picture book only contains a few "words"-roar and squeak are prominent-but more words are actually unnecessary. Youngsters will be attracted by the large, colorful pictures and will enjoy being able to "read" this one by themselves, making it a great jumping off place for book discussions.

 Death of Innocence:
The Story of the Hate Crime that Changed America

forward by the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson

written by Mamie Till-Mobley and Christopher Benson

five stars

The way I looked at it, discrimination was somebody else's problem... That's all Bo would know. In time, he would also know whites, children in school, even adults he would do business with. We made sure he would never be self-conscious around them. He would not see the signs, or the attitudes behind the facades. For him, they would not exist. There would come a time, though, when that strength would make him vulnerable.

Mamie Till-Mobley's only child, Emmett Louis Till, was murdered by white racists in Mississippi on this day, August 28, in 1955. This is her insightful story: of being black, of being a woman, of having a sheltered childhood and a difficult birthing and impossible husbands. The legendary Emmett Till becomes so much more than a historical figure in the hands of his mother and a living, breathing boy steps from the pages. The horrors that he and his mother endured also spring to life, so beware--this can be a tough read at times. It's worth it, though, to stick with it until the end. Till-Mobley's spirit and soul are beautiful. We could all take a page from her book.

We've got these fun reads lined up for next week.

• In the Unlikely Event
  written by Judy Blume
• The Miseducation of Cameron Post
  written by Emily M. Danforth
• Dear Hank Williams
  written by Kimberly Willis Holt
• The Silence of Our Friends
  written by Mark Long and Jim Demonakos
  illustrated by Nate Powell
• North Toward Home
  written by Willie Morris

Until then, happy reading!

MLC Reads: August 7, 2015

It's book review day here at the Mississippi Library Commission. Here are our highlights:

Copperhead: Volume 1

written by Jay Faerber

illustrated by Scott Godlewski and Ron Riley

five stars

Copperhead follows single mom Clara Bronson as she begins her new job as sheriff on the planet Copperhead. Clara may be in over her head when she takes on hillbilly aliens (!) and a mysterious murder, but she finds an unlikely ally in her deputy Boo, who helps her along the way. Copperhead is a great sci-fi western that will spark readers' imaginations. The illustrations are vibrant and action packed. We can't wait for volume 2!

Mississippi Remembers

Growing up in Mississippi, there is always the danger of becoming too accustomed and too inured to our tortured past. If we don't remind ourselves from time to time, we will forget the sacrifices, failures, and successes of those who came before us. Here are three such memorable men.

Michael Schwerner was born in New York City. In his CORE application, he said, "I have an emotional need to offer my services in the South." He was 24 years old when he was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in Mississippi.

Women through the Pages

It's the final week of Women's History of Month and we've got a few more books up our sleeve we want you to read. These books are either written by or about amazing women and they are available for your group to read through our Book Club in a Box program. Check these out!

Mississippi Collection

Collected Stories  by Eudora Welty - With a preface written by the author especially for this edition, this is the complete collection of stories by Eudora Welty. Including the earlier collections A Curtain of Green, The Wide Net, The Golden Apples, and The Bride of the Innisfallen, as well as previously uncollected ones, these forty-one stories demonstrate Eudora Welty's talent for writing from diverse points-of-view with “vision that is sweet by nature, always humanizing, uncannily objective, but never angry” (Washington Post).

The Help by Kathryn Stockett - Aibileen is a black maid in 1962 Jackson, Mississippi, who's always taken orders quietly, but lately she's unable to hold her bitterness back. Her friend Minny has never held her tongue but now must somehow keep secrets about her employer that leave her speechless. White socialite Skeeter just graduated college. She's full of ambition, but without a husband, she's considered a failure. Together, these seemingly different women join together to write a tell-all book about work as a black maid in the South, that could forever alter their destinies and the life of a small town...

Native Guard  by Natasha Trethewey - Through elegiac verse that honors her mother and tells of her own fraught childhood, Natasha Trethewey confronts the racial legacy of her native Deep South -- where one of the first black regiments, the Louisiana Native Guards, was called into service during the Civil War. Trethewey's resonant and beguiling collection is a haunting conversation between personal experience and national history.

The Last Resort: Taking the Mississippi Cure  by Norma Watkins – The memoir begins in childhood at Allison's Wells, a popular Mississippi spa for proper white people, run by her aunt. Young Norma wonders at a caste system that has colored people cooking every meal while forbidding their sitting with whites to eat. Once integration is court-mandated, her beloved father becomes a stalwart captain in defense of Jim Crow. A fine house, wonderful children, and a successful husband do not compensate for the shock of Mississippi's brutal response to change. When a civil rights lawyer offers love and escape, does a good southern lady dare leave her home state and closed society behind?

The Healing  by Jonathan Odell - In Antebellum Mississippi, Granada Satterfield has the mixed fortune to be born on the same day that her plantation mistress's daughter, Becky, dies of cholera. Believing that the newborn possesses some of her daughter's spirit, the Mistress Amanda adopts Granada and gives her a special place in the family despite her husband's protests. When The Master brings a woman named Polly Shine to help quell the debilitating plague that is sweeping through the slave quarters, Granada's life changes. Polly sees something in the young girl, a spark of "The Healing" 

Young Adult Collection            

Divergent by Veronica Roth - In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago world, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue--Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). All sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is--she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself. But she also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. 

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein - A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun. When “Verity” is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn’t stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she’s living a spy’s worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy?




Valuing the Vote Collection

With Courage and Cloth : Winning the Fight for a Woman's Right to Vote by Ann Bausum - Stunning archival photographs—some never before published—reams of research, and a deft and lively narrative tell this story as if it were hot off today's headlines. Any reader of this book won't easily forget the sacrifice and struggle of women who rose to champion Susan B. Anthony's 1876 clarion call: "We ask that all the civil and political rights that belong to citizens of the United States be guaranteed to us and our daughters forever."

This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer by Kay Mills - From her birth as the twentieth child of poor Mississippi sharecroppers, through her life as first a victim and then a champion of victim's rights and a leader of the civil rights movement, Kay Mills left no stone in Mrs. Hamer's life unturned.









For more information on any of these books or to reserve a kit for your library, please contact Ally Mellon at 601-432-4117 or amellon@mlc.lib.ms.us

More Than A Storyteller!

This week we are continuing our celebration of Women’s History Month by highlighting some of our favorite female authors.  Not only have these women proved that they can tell a good story, but they have also inspired us with their words and ideas.   

J.K. Rowling

 

J.K. Rowling is best known as the author of the Harry Potter series. The Harry Potter series has become the best selling book series in history, as well as the highest grossing film series in history.  In 2007, Forbes ranked Rowling as the forty-eighth most powerful celebrity. She has become known as one of the most influential women in Britain. 

Jacqueline Woodson

Jacqueline Woodson is the author of many children and young adult novels.  She won the Coretta Scott King Award in 2001 for her novel Miracle's Boys and, in 2014, the National Book Award for Brown Girl Dreaming.  She also won the ALA Margaret A. Edwards Award in 2006.  The majority of Jacqueline Woodson's writing focuses on race, gender, and sexual identity.  

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Nigerian author, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, won the Commonwealth Writer's Prize for her novel  Purple Hibiscus and the Orange Prize for her novel Half of a Yellow Sun. She also gave a TEDx in 2012 sharing her experience as an African feminist.  In April of 2014, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie was named one of the 39 writers under 40 in the Hay Festival and Rainbow Book Club project.

 Isabel Allende

Isabel Allende has written 20 books that have been translated into 35 languages and has sold over 65 million copies.  She has received 50 awards in more than 15 countries.  She is also the founder of the Isabel Allende Foundation.  Isabel Allende's mission for this foundation is to give vulnerable women and children access to reproductive rights, healthcare, education, and protection from violence.  

Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison is best know for her inspiring novels The Blues Eyes, Sula, and Beloved.  She has won the Pulitzer Prize, the American Book Award, and the Nobel Prize for Literature.  In 2012, she was also awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.  Toni Morrison's latest book, God Help the Child, is set to be published in April 2015. 

Jhumpa Lahiri

 

Jhumpa Lahiri is an Indian American author best known for her 1999 short story collection The Interpreter of Maladies and her 2013 novel The Lowland.  She won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2000 for Maladies. She is a member of the President's Committee on the the Arts and Humanities, appointed by President Barack Obama in 2013.  The majority of her literary work focuses on Indian immigrants coming to America.  She references her own experience and the experience of her parents when they first came to America.  An interesting fact about Jhumpa Lahiria is that her father worked as Librarian of the University of Rhode Island. 

Maya Angelou 

Maya Angelou, author of I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, is highly recognized by her achievements as an author, civil rights activist, professor, and so much more.  She has worked with Malcolm X and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and she recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" at President Bill Clinton's inauguration.   Her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Birds Sings influenced many other African-American feminist women in the 1970s to also share their writings.  Maya Angelou was the recipient of many awards for her literary works and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama in 2010.  

We have only highlighted a few authors in this blog post; however, there are many more women authors that have equally inspired us with their power of words.  Check out these authors and many more at the Mississippi Library Commission or your local library.

Book of the Day: March: Book One

 

The Book of the day, March: Book One by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and illustrated by Nate Powell. This graphic novel is dedicated to the life and Civil Rights work of Congressman John Lewis, and has received the 2014 Coretta Scott King Award.  March begins with Lewis’ vivid description of his childhood in rural Alabama through his college years in Nashville, Tennessee.  During this time Lewis recalls his inspirational meeting with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the start of the Nashville Student Movement, and his involvement in demonstrative sit-ins.  We also get to see other important figures of the Civil Rights movement such as: Rosa Parks, Jim Lawson and Z. Alexander Looby.

 

 Lewis even pays tribute to his school library and librarian, stating “I loved going to the library.  It was the first time I ever saw Black newspapers and magazines like JET, Ebony, the Baltimore Afro-American, or the Chicago Defender.  And I’ll never forget my librarian.” 

March: Book One is the first installment of John Lewis’ trilogy.  The next 2 volumes will be released over the next couple of years.  Come check out this book at the Mississippi Library Commission or your local library.  This novel is also a new title that will soon be part of the Book Club in a Box titles for public libraries.  For more information on Book Club in a Box contact Ally Mellon at 601-432-4117 or amellon@mlc.lib.ms.us.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

A patron put us to the test to see if we could locate any pictures or articles we could find in our microfilm collection about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Talk about a treasure hunt! We thought it would be great to share a few of the pictures we found with you!

 

"Advice For Living" was a monthly advice column in Ebony magazine from 1957-1958.

The King Center, located in Atlanta, GA, is the largest repository of primary material related to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. They have an online archive of documents available for browsing. For more glimpses into the life of this great civil rights leader check out the National Geographic Kids and Time photo galleries!

"Victim of Attack." 21 Sept. 1958: 40. Microfilm. The New York Times 1958 Sept 21-25.

“Advice For Living.” Nov. 1957.: 106. Microfilm. Ebony v.11-12, Nov 1955 – Oct. 1957 Reel 5.

[Picture with King Olev V] Associated Press 5 Apr. 1968: 25. Microfilm. The New York Times 1963 Apr 1-10B.

[Picture with Coretta Scott King] May 1968: 125. Microfilm. Ebony v.23, 7-12 May – Oct. 1968 No Index Reel 2 of 2.

Time: http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1952031,00.html

National Geographic Kids: http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/kids/photos/gallery/martin-luther-king-jr/#/01-martin-king-010909_14065_600x450.jpg

The King Center: http://www.thekingcenter.org/archive