Special Collections

Heaven

Marley has lived in heaven since she was two years old, when her mother found a postcard postmarked HEAVEN, OH, on a park bench and decided that was where she wanted to raise a family. And for twelve years, Marley's hometown has lived up to its name. She lives in a house by the river, has loving parents, a funny younger brother, good friends, and receives frequent letters from her mysterious uncle, Jack. Then one day a letter arrives from Alabama, and Marley's life is turned upsidedown. Marley doesn't even know who she is anymore--but where can she go for answers, when she's been deceived by the very people she should be able to trust the most?

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Separate Is Never Equal

Almost 10 years before Brown vs. Board of Education, Sylvia Mendez and her parents helped end school segregation in California.

An American citizen of Mexican and Puerto Rican heritage who spoke and wrote perfect English, Mendez was denied enrollment to a "Whites only" school.

Her parents took action by organizing the Hispanic community and filing a lawsuit in federal district court.

Their success eventually brought an end to the era of segregated education in California.

2015 Jane Addams Younger Reader Award,

2015 Pura Belpré Illustrator Honor Book

2015 Robert F. Sibert Honor Book

Date Added: 05/25/2017

The Land

The son of a prosperous landowner and a former slave, Paul-Edward Logan is unlike any other boy he knows. His white father has acknowledged him and raised him openly-something unusual in post-Civil War Georgia. But as he grows into a man he learns that life for someone like him is not easy. Black people distrust him because he looks white. White people discriminate against him when they learn of his black heritage. Even within his own family he faces betrayal and degradation. So at the age of fourteen, he sets out toward the only dream he has ever had: to find land every bit as good as his father's, and make it his own.

Once again inspired by her own history, Ms. Taylor brings truth and power to the newest addition to the award-winning Logan family stories.

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Return To Sender

After Tyler's father is injured in a tractor accident, his family is forced to hire migrant Mexican workers to help save their Vermont farm from foreclosure.

Tyler isn't sure what to make of these workers. Are they undocumented?

And what about the three daughters, particularly Mari, the oldest, who is proud of her Mexican heritage but also increasingly connected her American life.

Her family lives in constant fear of being discovered by the authorities and sent back to the poverty they left behind in Mexico.

Can Tyler and Mari find a way to be friends despite their differences?

In a novel full of hope, but no easy answers, Julia Alvarez weaves a beautiful and timely story that will stay with readers long after they finish it.

Winner of the Pura Belpre Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Heart and Soul

Kadir Nelson's Heart and Soul--the winner of numerous awards, including the 2012 Coretta Scott King Author Award and Illustrator Honor, and the recipient of five starred reviews--now features eight pages of discussion and curriculum material.

The story of America and African Americans is a story of hope and inspiration and unwavering courage. This is the story of the men, women, and children who toiled in the hot sun picking cotton for their masters; it's about the America ripped in two by Jim Crow laws; it's about the brothers and sisters of all colors who rallied against those who would dare bar a child from an education. It's a story of discrimination and broken promises, determination, and triumphs.

Told through the unique point of view and intimate voice of a one-hundred-year-old African-American female narrator, this inspiring book demonstrates that in gaining their freedom and equal rights, African Americans helped our country achieve its promise of liberty and justice--the true heart and soul of our nation.

Supports the Common Core State Standards

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Copper Sun

Stolen from her village, sold to the highest bidder, fifteen-year-old Amari has only one thing left of her own -- hope.

Amari's life was once perfect. Engaged to the handsomest man in her tribe, adored by her family, and living in a beautiful village, she could not have imagined everything could be taken away from her in an instant. But when slave traders invade her village and brutally murder her entire family, Amari finds herself dragged away to a slave ship headed to the Carolinas, where she is bought by a plantation owner and given to his son as a birthday present.

Survival seems all that Amari can hope for. But then an act of unimaginable cruelty provides her with an opportunity to escape, and with an indentured servant named Polly she flees to Fort Mose, Florida, in search of sanctuary at the Spanish colony. Can the illusive dream of freedom sustain Amari and Polly on their arduous journey, fraught with hardship and danger?

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Sweet Whispers, Brother Rush

A beautiful ghost appears to a troubled teen and shows her the heartbreaking secrets of her family&’s past Fifteen-year-old Teresa has fallen in love—with a ghost. The handsome man that she&’s passed on the street a few times captures her attention, and she thinks he notices her too. But when the man suddenly appears inside her home, hovering in the air and passing through solid furniture, Teresa realizes this isn&’t going to be a typical crush. The ghost is Brother Rush, a man tied to Teresa&’s past, who has come to show her the ways her life has special meaning, and that her problems at school and at home are not what they seem.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Duey's Tale

A tale for both children and young adults about a seed, bottle and a branch of tree.

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

The Surrender Tree

It is 1896. Cuba has fought three wars for independence and still is not free. People have been rounded up in reconcentration camps with too little food and too much illness. Rosa is a nurse, but she dares not go to the camps. So she turns hidden caves into hospitals for those who know how to find her.

Black, white, Cuban, Spanish—Rosa does her best for everyone. Yet who can heal a country so torn apart by war? Acclaimed poet Margarita Engle has created another breathtaking portrait of Cuba.

The Surrender Tree is a 2009 Newbery Honor Book, the winner of the 2009 Pura Belpre Medal for Narrative and the 2009 Bank Street - Claudia Lewis Award, and a 2009 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

The Legend Of Africania

Children's book initially explaining the intervention of European exploitation of Africa,the kidnapping of the nation suppression of African expression ( stolen legacy) of self and theft of the motherland's important minerals.

A Coretta Scott King Medal Winner

Date Added: 05/25/2017

I Never Had It Made

The bestselling autobiography of American baseball and civil rights legend Jackie RobinsonBefore Barry Bonds, before Reggie Jackson, before Hank Aaron, baseball's stars had one undeniable trait in common: they were all white. In 1947, Jackie Robinson broke that barrier, striking a crucial blow for racial equality and changing the world of sports forever. I Never Had It Made is Robinson's own candid, hard-hitting account of what it took to become the first black man in history to play in the major leagues.I Never Had It Made recalls Robinson's early years and influences: his time at UCLA, where he became the school's first four-letter athlete; his army stint during World War II, when he challenged Jim Crow laws and narrowly escaped court martial; his years of frustration, on and off the field, with the Negro Leagues; and finally that fateful day when Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers proposed what became known as the "Noble Experiment"—Robinson would step up to bat to integrate and revolutionize baseball.More than a baseball story, I Never Had It Made also reveals the highs and lows of Robinson's life after baseball. He recounts his political aspirations and civil rights activism; his friendships with Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, William Buckley, Jr., and Nelson Rockefeller; and his troubled relationship with his son, Jackie, Jr.I Never Had It Made endures as an inspiring story of a man whose heroism extended well beyond the playing field.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Goin' Someplace Special

Confronted with the indignities and humiliations of segregated Nashville in the 1950s, young 'Tricia Ann holds her head high and remembers that she is "somebody, a human being--no better, no worse than anybody else in this world."

For the first time, 'Tricia Ann has been allowed to venture outside her community all by herself. Her grandmother has prepared her well, fortifying her "with enough love, respect, and pride to overcome any situation."

'Tricia Ann, though frustrated by the Jim Crow laws that forbid her, as an African American, to enter certain restaurants and hotels, or even to sit on park benches marked "For Whites Only," rises above her pain and makes her way to one of the only places in the city that welcomes her with open arms: the public library.

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

The Patchwork Quilt

Tanya loved listening to her grand-mother talk about the patchwork quilt as she cut and stitched together the pieces of colorful fabric. A scrap of blue from brother Jim's favorite old pants, a piece of gold left over from Mama's Christmas dress, a bright square from Tanya's Halloween costume-all fit together to make a quilt of memories.

But one day Tanya's grandmother becomes ill, and Tanya doesn't know how to help her. It's then she decides to finish Grandma's masterpiece herself, and with the help of Mama and the whole family, she sets to work.

All the trust and sharing between a young girl and her treasured grand-mother is captured in Valerie Flournoy's story, lovingly illustrated in Jerry Pinkney's evocative paintings.

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Rosa

Fifty years after her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, city bus, Mrs. Rosa Parks is still one of the most important figures in the American civil rights movement. This tribute to Mrs. Parks is a celebration of her courageous action and the events that followed.

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Medal

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Gone Crazy in Alabama

Newbery Honor winner and New York Times bestselling author Rita Williams-Garcia tells the story of the Gaither sisters, who are about to learn what it's like to be fish out of water as they travel from the streets of Brooklyn to the rural South for the summer of a lifetime.Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern are off to Alabama to visit their grandmother, Big Ma, and her mother, Ma Charles. Across the way lives Ma Charles's half sister, Miss Trotter. The two half sisters haven't spoken in years. As Delphine hears about her family history, she uncovers the surprising truth that's been keeping the sisters apart. But when tragedy strikes, Delphine discovers that the bonds of family run deeper than she ever knew possible. Powerful and humorous, this companion to the award-winning One Crazy Summer and P.S. Be Eleven will be enjoyed by fans of the first two books as well as by readers meeting these memorable sisters for the first time.

Winner of the Coretta Scott King award

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Quilted Landscapes

Twenty-six young people of different ages and nationalities describe their experience of leaving their countries and immigrating to the the United States.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Morning on the Lake

A Native American boy relates his encounters with wild creatures in three episodes: "Morning," "Noon" and "Night."

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Honey, I Love

a poem made into a book

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Abuela

While riding on a bus with her grandmother, a little girl imagines that they are carried up into the sky and fly over the sights of New York City.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

The Rainbow People

A collection of twenty Chinese folktales that were passed on by word of mouth for generations, as told by some old-timers newly settled in the United States.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Hairs / Pelitos

In English and Spanish, a child describes how each person in the family has hair that looks and acts different, Papa’s like a broom, Kiki’s like fur, and Mama’s with the smell of warm bread.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Wings

Are you brave enough to be your true self?

Ikarus Jackson is. But it isn't always easy. The people in his neighborhood point at his wings. The kids at school laugh. The teachers call him a distraction.

One girl identifies with him, but she is too shy to speak up.

Finally, when his classmates' taunts send Ikarus drifting into the sky, the girl sets out in search of him, and so begins her own journey of self-discovery -- leaving both of them transformed.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Shades of Black

Poetic text celebrate the beauty and diversity of African American children.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Grandfather Counts

When her mother's father comes from China, Helen, who is biracial, develops a special bond with her grandfather despite their age and language differences.

Date Added: 05/25/2017

Baseball Saved Us

A Japanese American boy learns to play baseball when he and his family are forced to live in an internment camp during World War II, and his ability to play helps him after the war is over.

Date Added: 05/25/2017