Black Issues Book Review back issues from May 2000:
Letters to the editor
May 01, 2000; ... DEAR EDITOR, My sister recently loaned me her copy of your magazine to read--I like it! Please sign me up for a year's subscription. Thanks! Lorili Karen Loera Boulder, CO Just thought you might like to know that several colleges and universities are ...
From the editor-in-chief
May 01, 2000; ... from the editor-in-chief Since we started publishing BIBR last year, we've been taking risks. But probably no issue reflects that as much as the one you are reading right now. As our readership has grown -- both in subscribers and in newsstand circulation -- we've been heartened by your ...
Read aloud rituals bind a family across generations
May 01, 2000; ... executive editor's view: Read Aloud Rituals Bind a Family Across Generations One of the side benefits of frequent visits to my hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, to look in on my 81-year-old mother is the delightful opportunity to spend time also with her great-granddaughter -- and my ...
Expatriate: James Baldwin
May 01, 2000; ... Expatriate James Baldwin: The village in the south of France where Baldwin spent the last years of his life remembers him kindly, as someone who greeted each person he passed on the road as if he knew them The first time I met James Baldwin, he set my afro on fire. It was the 1970s, and ...
Statement 2000: Writers Bill of Rights
May 01, 2000; ... In 1926, Langston Hughes published the essay "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain," to define and support the role of the black artist. Hughes' writings inspired a coterie of writers, including Wallace Thurman and Zora Neale Hurston, to launch the short-lived literary magazine Fire. Almost ...
Deals
May 01, 2000; ... Doubleday Senior Editor Janet Hill acquired the heavily illustrated book Crowns: Portraits of Black Women in Church Hats by photographer Michael Cunningham and journalist Craig Marberry. Celebrating the regalia of church hats, Doubleday will release the book during Christmas 2000 gift book ...
On the shelf
May 01, 2000; ... on the shelf I am thrilled and excited by the warm welcome of the staff at BIBR as we dive into the deep well of African American authorship to offer the most incisive, up-to-the-minute insight on what's out now. Summer is finally upon us and the new selections available today are as ...
Black Girl in Paris
May 01, 2000; ... Black Girl in Paris Becoming an expatriate seems the ultimate form of escape. Not merely the temporary idyll of a week at the beach or in an exotic foreign city, living abroad allows one the possibility of reinventing a purpose and an identity, the language of the adopted country ...
Pictures of a Dying Man
May 01, 2000; ... Pictures of a Dying Man With his critically acclaimed debut novel, Flickering Shadows, Barbadian-born Agymah Kamau introduced himself to the literary world as a highly skilled writer. His follow-up book, Pictures of a Dying Man, leaves no doubt that Kamau is first-rate. In his sophomore ...
Father Found
May 01, 2000; ... Father Found R.M. Johnson's second novel (a follow-up to his widely acclaimed debut, The Harris Men), does not allow the reader to retreat or escape from the disturbing topic of child abuse. With its backdrop of dismal inner-city alleys and rain-drenched nights, Father Found dives ...
Scream In Silence
May 01, 2000; ... Scream In Silence MacAlister is in the driver's seat again, taking readers on a tour of Lincoln Prairie, a suburb of Chicago, Illinois, in Eleanor Taylor Bland's eighth Marti MacAlister mystery, Scream In Silence. While exploring this small town, readers will encounter a perpetrator who ...
Slapboxing with Jesus
May 01, 2000; ... Slapboxing with Jesus Victor D. LaValle's charismatic debut collection could just as well be titled "Living for the City." Like the hero of Stevie Wonder's funky tale of urban alienation, LaValle's young men struggle to get a grip while the city threatens to devour them. Although the ...
The Step Between: A Carole Ann Gibson Mystery
May 01, 2000; ... The Step Between: A Carole Ann Gibson Mystery In her third novel to feature Carole Ann "C.A." Gibson, the martial-arts-trained lawyer turned security expert, Penny Mickelbury delivers a businesslike mystery about businesslike people. C.A. is a respected criminal defense attorney ...
Devil is Riding: Tamara Hayle Mystery
May 01, 2000; ... Devil is Riding: Tamara Hayle Mystery Devil is Riding is the sixth installment of Valerie Wilson Wesley's popular detective series. Tamara Hayle has been hired by a prominent New Jersey couple to find their missing 18-year-old daughter. Her search takes her to the Atlantic City ...
Bruised Hibiscus
May 01, 2000; ... Bruised Hibiscus It is 1954 and the body of a dead woman drifts ashore and reawakens a memory long buried between two friends. The memory and the woman's body are just the start of this beautifully lyrical novel that exposes some ugly business on the island of Trinidad. After more than ...
Gospels' trailblazers: GIve me that old time religion
May 01, 2000; ... Gospel's Trailblazers: Give Me That Old Time Religion You know the market is working in mysterious ways when sales, of gospel records have tripled and more than 2,000 radio stations have begun playing the music over the last few years. Driven by those seeking spiritual solace in a ...
The Lady, The Melody, and The Word: An autobiography
May 01, 2000; ... The Lady, The Melody, and The Word: An Autobiography When I was asked to review Shirley Caesar's new autobiography, The Lady, The Melody, and The Word, I was pleased. I knew of Ms. Caesar as the First Lady Of Gospel Music, and I was certain her story would be inspirational. What I didn't ...
Love Unlimited: Insights on Life and Love
May 01, 2000; ... Love Unlimited: Insights on Life and Love Love Unlimited begins chronologically with Barry's days on the tough streets of South Central L.A., moves to his time as a jack-of-all-trades starving artist and ends with his current star status. However, like too many autobiographies, Barry ...
Brandy: An Intimate Look
May 01, 2000; ... Brandy: An Intimate Look Brandy: An Intimate Look by Karu Daniels is a highly entertaining account of the career of Brandy Norwood. Nearly every page contains a colorful photograph of Brandy with celebrities that include Lil' Kim, Monica, Naughty by Nature and Jamie Foxx. The book also ...
Nat King Cole
May 01, 2000; ... Nat King Cole Today's young generation, the "X" -- and now the "Y" generation -- may not know much about Nat King Cole, save that he's the father of the famous Natalie Cole. They may not know that he was more than just a pop singer. They may not know that long before Oprah or Bill Cosby, ...
Wynton Marsalis: Skain's Domain
May 01, 2000; ... Wynton Marsalis: Skain's Domain It's ironic that in the 100th anniversary year of Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington's birth, comes the first biography of the man who idolized him -- Wynton Marsalis, and who continues to perpetuate much of the performance of the Duke's compositions. Wynton ...
THe Doggfather: The Times, Trials, and Hardcore Truths of Snoop Dogg
May 01, 2000; ... Tha Doggfather: The Times, Trials, and Hardcore Truths of Snoop Dogg This autobiography, by one of the hip hop nation's superstars, provides a much-needed window on the emergence of gangsta rap in Southern California. Calvin Broadus, aka Snoop Dogg, has chronicled his own young life, ...
Africa's walking library
May 01, 2000; ... Africa's Walking Library: An African-born scholar lays out the living principles of African orature and shows how both everyday people and African artists have immortalized these ancient verbal art forms for the world to share. The words by griot Mamadou Kouyate in his preamble to ...
Autobiography of a People: Three Centuries of African History by Those Who Lived It
May 01, 2000; ... Autobiography of a People: Three Centuries of African History by Those Who Lived It History is generally told best by those who bear witness to events as they unfold. In this anthology, Herb Boyd, who has taught black studies for nearly 30 years, allows African Americans a voice seldom ...
Life Lessons My Mother Taught Me
May 01, 2000; ... Life Lessons My Mother Taught Me Jean Childs Young's greatest distinction was not necessarily being former first lady of Atlanta, but quite possibly her exemplary life as a mother, teacher and humanitarian. Those of us who live outside the Atlanta community, who have not been direct ...
African American Literacy Criticism 1773-2000
May 01, 2000; ... African American Literary Criticism 1773-2000 By including such a broad range of material (journal entries, poetry and letters along with more standard scholarly essays), Hazel Arnett Ervin recognizes the breadth and the duration of the African American literary criticism. Her fresh look ...
Walking On Water: Black American Lives at the Turn of the 21st Century
May 01, 2000; ... Walking On Water: Black American Lives at the Turn of the 21st Century Randall Kenan is the first to admit that he does not provide the full quilt of black America in Walking on Water, but there are enough beguiling patches to keep a reader turning pages as he moves from Bangor, Maine, ...
The Cornel West Reader
May 01, 2000; ... The Cornel West Reader It's no wonder Cornel West, increasingly recognized as one of the greatest thinkers of our generation, is as popular among young radical college students as he is with academia's elite. As exhibited in this anthology -- a selection of his essays, magazine columns ...
Mandela: The Authorized Biography
May 01, 2000; ... Mandela: The Authorized Biography When Nelson Mandela walked out of prison before a worldwide television audience in February 1990, most of those watching knew him only as a leader who was more mythical than real. Even his own children knew him more as a legend than a father. While the ...
Daily Cornbread: 365 Secrets for a Healthy Mind, Body and Spirit
May 01, 2000; ... Daily Cornbread: 365 Secrets for a Healthy Mind, Body and Spirit Stephanie Stokes Oliver, editor at Essence magazine and founder of Heart & Soul magazine, takes the complexity out of healthy alternative living. The author has dedicated her career to empowering women, but now, in her ...
Divided Arsenal: Race and the American State During World War II
May 01, 2000; ... Divided Arsenal: Race and the American State During World War II "War is hell; when will it end?" So sang the late Marvin Gaye in his soulful hit of 1971, "What's Going On." If Daniel Kryder, a political scientist who teaches at MIT, had a voice (and I do not know that he ...
The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks
May 01, 2000; ... The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks This book will have a lasting effect on many critical thinkers. Robinson explores the controversial topic of reparations owed to African Americans from a variety of perspectives, ranging from the individual to the global. The Debt is a well-written ...
What Brothas Think, What Sistahs Know About Sex
May 01, 2000; ... What Brothas Think, What Sistahs Know About Sex The he say/she say approach of husband-and-wife writing team Denene Millner and Nick Chiles holds terrific appeal. Who among the newly dating or newly married wouldn't benefit from hearing how another couple sorts things out when it comes ...
The Bridge Over the Racial Divide
May 01, 2000; ... The Bridge Over the Racial Divide Experts are divided over whether racial bias and other barriers to equal economic opportunity have declined in recent years. What they do know for sure is that wealth in America has become more concentrated with the rich claiming a larger ...
Shaping a spirit: Black women sculptors who changed our times
May 01, 2000; ... Shaping a Spirit: Black women sculptors who changed our times Until the end of the 19th century, women could not attain training in sculpture. Mastery of anatomy would expose them to the male nude. Segregation laws in academic institutions further obstructed African American women. Meta ...
Who wants to be a MacArthur genius?
May 01, 2000; ... Who Wants to Be a MacArthur Genius? Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot vividly remembers the moment she learned she had been named a MacArthur Fellow. The year was 1984 and the young sociology professor had just published The Good High School The book received high marks for her pioneering ...
Odd men out
May 01, 2000; ... Odd Men Out: James Baldwin introduced gay male themes in black literature; E. Lynn Harris put them on the mainstream bestseller list. Here's what happened before and since. Even during the heyday of the Harlem Renaissance, the decade from approximately 1920 to 1930 that marks the ...
Out in print
May 01, 2000; ... Out in Print: Gay authors discuss the finer points of publishing As the book publishing world has become somewhat democratized by anthologies and the Internet, a debate rages about the quality of today's black gay literature. Although James Earl Hardy describes himself as "encouraged by ...
Dear Dr. Rosie
May 01, 2000; ... I have just self published my first book and now I have I,000 copies sitting in my garage. What should I do now? You should know that before you publish your book, a lot of pre-marketing needs to be done, even before it is ready for the shelves. However, you can still do plenty to make ...
Ties That Bind Way Down Deep
May 01, 2000; ... Ties That Bind Way Down Deep At some point, the need for companionship hits us all. Kaj Richards and Dana Alexander, the main characters of Monique Gilmore-Scott's sixth novel, Ties That Bind Way Down Deep, are no different. A former college football standout, Kaj, presently a ...
Almost Out of Love
May 01, 2000; ... Almost Out of Love "Life without passion is like driving down an endless, deserted highway on cruise control with no destination in mind." As part of the cover blurb, this sentence prepares the reader for an adventure in reading that includes a great mix of unrealized passion and a ...
If Walls Could Talk
May 01, 2000; ... If Walls Could Talk The Midwest may never be the same. If Walls Could Talk, Vincent R. Alexandria's debut mystery slaps Kansas City, Missouri, in the midst of malice and murder with as much grit and slime as any bi-coastal noire whodunit. Detective Joe Johnson must investigate the murder ...
Cassandra
May 01, 2000; ... Cassandra Cassandra by Violet Barungi is a witty tale of an independent woman full of life. Cassandra, a young woman in her early 20s, is devoted to her job as editor at a publishing company. Cassandra's world is turned inside out when she meets the man of her dreams. But Barungi tells ...
Living her
May 01, 2000; ... An underrecognized cultural force, black lesbian Waters seek to emerge from the margins It is now 18 years since the pioneering collection. All the Women are White. All the Blacks are Men. But Some of Us Are Still Brave, was published. Responding to the negative ways in which black ...
Mother, daughter, sister, lover...
May 01, 2000; ... Classic and current works by lesbian authors Zami: A New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde Crossing Press, April 1988, $14.95, ISBN 0-895-94122-8 A classic. A fictional autobiography of her childhood and coming of age. The Gilda Stories by ...
Africans & Asians: Breaking boundaries
May 01, 2000; ... Africans & Asians Breaking Boundaries: What do we Asians and Africans know about each other? What do we know about ourselves? Recently, I gave a lecture in New York about the Chinese Cuban community in Havana. One young black man asked with some emotion: Did you meet anyone with my ...
Looking up the N-word
May 01, 2000; ... Looking up the N-word: How a one-person challenge to a dictionary definition led to a sea change in American reference books Publishers of most leading dictionaries may have been taken off guard by a battle over that word, which began a couple years ago, but all say the episode forced ...
Networking your family's history: Roots
May 01, 2000; ... History is a clock that people use to tell their time of day. It is a compass they use to find themselves on the map of human geography. It tells them where they are and what they are. -John Henrik Clarke Ours is a history worth recording. Alex Haley slammed home this fact in ...
Never Before, Never Again: The Stirring Autobiography of Eddie Robinson, The Winningest Coach in the History of College Football
May 01, 2000; ... Never Before, Never Again: The Stirring Autobiography of Eddie Robinson, The Winningest Coach in the History of College Football Coach Eddie Robinson's name will go down in the history of sports as the winningest college football coach of all time. Never Before, Never Again chronicles ...
Ricky Williams: Freadlocks to Ditka
May 01, 2000; ... Ricky Williams: Dreadlocks to Ditka With his long dreadlocks, feathery voice and fierce running style, Ricky Williams has rapidly become a sensation ill the world of football. Dreadlocks to Ditka, written by veteran sports writer Steve Richardson, examines Williams' journey from a broken ...
How to raise a reader
May 01, 2000; ... Reading with your child at home The message from educators and practitioners is all too clear: reading with your child at home from infancy through elementary school will help him become a more successful reader. And subsequently, a more successful student. According to the ...
Young adult nonfiction
May 01, 2000; ... Silent Thunder: A Civil War Story by Andrea Davis Pinkey Jump at the Sun/Hyperion Books for Children September 1999, $14.99, ISBN 0-786-80439-4 In 1862, 11-year-okd Summer and her 13-year-- old brother Rosco take turns describing how life on the quiet Virginia ...
Brother and sister relationship between siblings
May 01, 2000; ... Brother and Sister Relationships between Siblings Relationships between siblings are explored in two new offerings featured in this issue's Children's Bookshelf. In a coming-of-age story, Laura Pegram has created a wonderful picture book, one which addresses the feelings of neglect and ...
Daughter's Day Blues
May 01, 2000; ... Daughter's Day Blues "Is there a day for daughters like the one for mothers?" solemnly asked Phyllis Mae of her grandmother (nicknamed `Nana'), as they were cleaning up from a Mother's Day celebration the family had earlier for her mother and Nana. For Phyllis Mae, the main character of ...
Fly, Eagle, Fly! An African Tale
May 01, 2000; ... Fly, Eagle, Fly! An African Tale Many images assail our children from the media and interactions with the larger society. Children of African descent may often feel that their life is restricted to their present condition. It's the struggle to instill a sense of self-worth, value and ...
Virgie Goes to School with Us Boys
May 01, 2000; ... Virgie Goes to School with Us Boys Virgie Goes to School with Us Boys by Elizabeth Fitzgerald Howard tells the story of a young girl's struggle for her freedom right alongside her brothers. Its focus is a young African American girl who is determined to go to school as her older brothers ...
The Secret of the Stones
May 01, 2000; ... The Secret of the Stones Award-winning author Robert D. San Souci bases his retelling of this folktale from several sources, including Fred W. Allsopp's Folklore of Romantic Arkansas, Volume II, and Virginia Holladay's Bantu Tales. John and Clara, a childless couple, labored together ...
The Honest-To-Goodness Truth
May 01, 2000; ... The Honest-To-Goodness Truth Award-winning author Patricia McKissack partners with acclaimed children's illustrator Giselle Potter to create this humorous tale of how a young girl's promise to "never lie again" goes unexpectedly awry. After being punished for getting caught in an ...
Aurora reading club
May 01, 2000; ... Preserving a Legacy of Learning and Giving Founded in 1894, the Aurora Reading Club in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is one of the oldest African American women's reading clubs in the United States. Though established amid an oppressive social climate for black women, the club pursued a ...