Kindred by Octavia Butler – Dana, a black woman, finds herself repeatedly transported to the antebellum South, where she must make sure that Rufus, the plantation owner’s son, survives to father Dana’s ancestor. (This title has also been adapted into a graphic novel.)
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates – Told through the author’s own evolving understanding of the subject over the course of his life comes a bold and personal investigation into America’s racial history and its contemporary echoes. (Coates also wri tes Black Panther for Marvel Comics.)
An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz – The first history of the United States told from the perspective of indigenous peoples.
New Poets of Native Nations edited by Heid E. Erdrich – Gathers poets of diverse ages, styles, languages, and tribal affiliations to present the extraordinary range and power of new Native poetry. Heid E. Erdrich has selected twenty-one poets whose first books were published after the year 2000 to highlight the exciting works coming up after Joy Harjo and Sherman Alexie.
An American Marriage by Tayari Jones – Newlyweds Celestial and Roy, the living embodiment of the New South, are settling into the routine of their life together when Roy is sent to prison for a crime he didn’t commit. An insightful look into the lives of people who are bound and separated by forces beyond their control.
Crazy Rich Asians (Crazy Rich trilogy, bk 1) by Kevin Kwan – Envisioning a quality-time summer vacation in the humble Singapore home of a boy she hopes to marry, Chinese American Rachel Chu is unexpectedly introduced to a rich and scheming clan that viciously competes against other wealthy families and strongly opposes their son’s relationship with an American girl.
March by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin, art by Nate Powell – A three-volume graphic novel, a vivid first-hand account of John Lewis’ lifelong struggle for civil and human rights, meditating in the modern age on the distance traveled since the days of Jim Crow and segregation. Rooted in Lewis’ personal story, it also reflects on the highs and lows of the broader civil rights movement.
Ball Lightning by Cixin Liu – After witnessing his parents’ bizarre death by ball lightning, Chin uncovers a new frontier in particle physics that pits him against a weapons-obsessed army major and an unscrupulous physicist.
The Grace of Kings (Dandelion Dynasty bk. 1) by Ken Liu – Becoming the best of friends after a series of adventures fighting against vast conscripted armies, a bandit and a duke’s son become the rival leaders of separate factions with very different ideas about justice and politics.
Monstress volume 1: Awakening by Marjorie Liu – Set in an alternate matriarchal 1900’s Asia, in a richly imagined world of art deco-inflected steam punk, Monstress tells the story of a teenage girl who is struggling to survive the trauma of war, and who shares a mysterious psychic link with a monster of tremendous power, a connection that will transform them both and make them the target of both human and otherworldly powers.
Down the River Unto the Sea by Walter Mosley – After serving time in Rikers Island solitary for assault, Joe King Oliver, who is an ex-NYPD investigator working as a private detective, receives a note from a woman who admits she was paid to frame him, compelling him to investigate.
There There by Tommy Orange – A novel—which grapples with the complex history of Native Americans; with an inheritance of profound spirituality; and with a plague of addiction, abuse and suicide—follows 12 characters, each of whom has private reasons for traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow.
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki – A novelist on a remote island off the west coast of Canada is linked to a bullied and depressed Tokyo teenager after discovering a Hello Kitty lunchbox that washed ashore.
Rabbit-Proof Fence (also published as Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence) by Doris Pilkington, whose Aboriginal name is Nugi Garimara – Three mixed-race Australian girls, having been taken from their Aboriginal families, escape and return home on foot, without supplies or gear, while trying to evade recapture, in an account based on a true story.
Trail of Lightning (The Sixth World, bk 1) by Rebecca Roanhorse – When a small town needs her help in finding a missing girl, Maggie Hoskie, a Dinetah monster hunter and supernaturally gifted killer, reluctantly enlists the help of an unconventional medicine man to uncover the terrifying truth behind the disappearance—and her own past.
Fruit of the Drunken Tree by Ingrid Rojas Contreras – A novel set against the violence of 1990s Columbia follows a sheltered girl and a teen maid, who forge an unlikely friendship as the families of both struggle to maintain stability amidst Bogotâa’s rapidly escalating violence.
X by Ilyasah Shabazz and Kekla Magoon – Cowritten by Malcolm X’s daughter, this riveting and revealing novel follows the formative years of the man whose words and actions shook the world. X follows Malcolm from his childhood to his imprisonment for theft at age twenty, when he found the faith that would lead him to forge a new path and command a voice that still resonates today.
The House of Broken Angels by Luis Alberto Urrea – Across one bittersweet weekend in their San Diego neighborhood, revelers mingle among the palm trees and cacti, celebrating the lives of family patriarch Miguel “Big Angel” De La Cruz and his mother, and recounting the many tales that have passed into family lore.
The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon – Natasha, whose family is hours away from being deported, and Daniel, a first generation Korean American who strives to live up to his parents’ expectations, unexpectedly fall in love and must determine which path they will choose in order to be together.