Explores life in the mountains of Kenya during the early days of white settlement. Faced with a choice between an alluring new religion and their own ancestral customs, the Gikuyu people are torn between those who fear the unknown and those who see beyond it.

"Set in the wake of the Mau Mau rebellion and on the cusp of Kenya's independence from Britain, A Grain of Wheat follows a group of villagers whose lives have been transformed by the 1952-1960 Emergency. At the center of it all is the reticent Mugo, the village's chosen hero and a man haunted by a terrible secret. As we learn of the villagers' tangled histories in a narrative interwoven with myth and peppered with allusions to real-life leaders, including...

Brakwa waits at the airport and cocaine is found in his suitcase and he must prove that he is innocent.

Andy, an Afro-American boy living in Nigeria, and his friend Ihanyi, attend Akataka, a masquerade parade for grown-ups.

Adultery, incest, and questions of racial identity simmer beneath the tranquil surface of suburban life in this novel, set in a small New Jersey town of the early 1900s. Lovely young Laurentine is obsessed with her "bad blood," inherited from a common-law interracial union. Proud and independent, she longs for the respectability of a conventional marriage. Laurentine's vivacious and self-confident cousin, Melissa, also aspires to "marry up." But a...

This ironically titled tale by an influential figure in African-American literature explores the tragic effects of color prejudice and self-hatred. Jessie Redmon Fauset's 1933 novel paints a haunting portrait of internalized racism with its depiction of a domineering mother whose determination for her children to pass as white leads to devastating results for the entire family. African-American editor, poet, essayist, and novelist Jessie Redmon Fauset...