Black Issues Book Review articles from July 2002

Black Issues Book Review archives from July 2002

From the editor-in-chief.(self-publishing challenges)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Omar Tyree is one aggressive brother. Few authors have just picked up the phone and called me in my Virginia office to ask to be the cover story for Black Issues Book Review. But that's precisely what Omar did several years ago. After I told...

Executive editor's view.(customer relations)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... A few months ago, I found myself in one of those big, anonymous cookie-cutter book-stores--you know the kind, with the faux charm of oversized club chairs and a giant espresso machine in the coffee bar next to the magazine racks. I was looking...

Praise for Ilyasah. (letters to the editor).
July 1, 2002... I read Growing Up X, and just like The Autobiography of Malcolm X, it has changed my life. Like Ilyasah, I too lost my father at a young age, and I felt every word she wrote. Her book is wonderful and everyone should have a copy in their...

Reviewer got it wrong? (letters to the editor).
July 1, 2002... The review of Lisa Teasley's Glow in the Dark by Nichole Palmer is an outrageous smear. Did she read the same book as some of the black critical thinkers like The Village Voice's Greg Tate and Kevin Powell, who have lauded this book? I...

More on BEA. (letters to the editor).
July 1, 2002... I really enjoyed Ms. Osborne's article on BookExpo America 2002, in the May-June issue. I am interested in getting more information about this wonderful article, especially about the African American Booksellers Conference and other contact...

BIBR responds. (letters to the editor).
July 1, 2002... From time-to-time we provide service information for our readers on various topics, including literary collectives, book clubs and self-publishers. In this month's special report (page 66), we offer a variety of literary information useful to...

Sounding off. (letters to the editor).
July 1, 2002... I was reading the audio department of your May-June issue, and want to add my two cents to the plus side of Peter Francis James' skills (James narrated In My Father's House by Ernest Gaines, page reviewed 26). He has me spoiled for all other...

Deals. (Between the lines: the inside scoop on what's happening in the publishing industry).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Leslie Esdaile may be one of the hardest working writers in the publishing industry. Over the next year, she will have new releases--ranging from romance novels to horror stories--from BET/Arabesque Books, St. Martin's Press, Genesis Press and...

Events corner. (Between the lines: the inside scoop on what's happening in the publishing industry).
July 1, 2002... Harlem Book Fair New York, NY July 20, 2002 135th Street between Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Blvd. and Malcolm X Blvd. (Lenox Ave.) www.qbr.com For more information contact: Nancy Flowers at 212-348-1681 The Langston Hughes...

Tracy Sherrod Literary Services. (News).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... After 17 years in publishing, Tracy Sherrod has formed Tracy Sherrod Literary Services. Sherrod pondered the idea for more than a year before leaving her post as senior editor for Simon & Schuster's Pocket Books imprint this past February....

Crown Journeys. (News).(new book series, Crown Publishing)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... This fall, Crown Publishing will introduce Crown Journeys, a unique series of books that will "match the world's most fascinating places with the writer's best able to convey their spirit and allure." Leading the series is After the Dance: A...

Awards spotlight. (News).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Suzan-Lori Parks' play Topdog/Underdog won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, making Parks the first African-American woman to win in the category. The announcement came the morning after Topdog opened on Broadway at the Ambassador Theatre to...

BIBR spotlight: Toure: a charmed life.(author of 'The Portable Promised Land')
July 1, 2002... In 1992, a then-21-year-old who went only by the name Toure--he won't divulge his last name--arrived in New York City to pursue a writing career. The ambitious, and perhaps naive, Boston native hadn't even taken a serious literary or writing...

Beyond Bricks and Mortar: booksellers are using novel ways to get books to where the readers are. (market buzz).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... In 1999, Ruth Bridges got her act together and took it on the road--literally. Nine years before, in 1990, she launched Atlantic Bookpost, a home-based, mail-order book business as a sideline to her full-time job as a law librarian. ...

Evanston Township High School sponsors Book Club for teen students. (books N clubs).
July 1, 2002... On a recent Monday afternoon, in the micro-resource center located on the second floor of Evanston Township High School, a group of teenage students are engaged in an engrossing conversation. The resource center is one of the school's two...

Net censorship: the countdown. (book bytes).(Children's Internet Protection Act)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... The recently enacted Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) requires that public libraries who receive federal funding through the universal service discount program, known as E-rate, must enforce safety guidelines and use technology that...

Net news: Oxford University Press www.oxfordreference.com. (book bytes).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Tired of thumbing through your old dictionary to look up the spelling of a word? Need to research a topic in a hurry? Oxford University Press announces its new online installment, Oxford Reference Online: The Core Collection, which brings...

Online booksellers: Amazon.com: an author's friend or foe. (book bytes).(Brief Article)(Buyers Guide)
July 1, 2002... Amazon.com offers book buyers the option of buying a new original edition of the book of their choice or a used copy at a discounted price, usually displayed simultaneously, which has the Author's Guild up in arms. The Guild is urging members...

Scottsboro, Alabama: A Story in Linoleum Cuts.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Lin Shi Khan and Tony Perez edited by Andrew Lee, with a foreword by Robin D.G. Kelley New York University Press, July 2002 $26.95, ISBN 0-814-75176-8 For those who remember--and refuse to forget--the racially charged "Scottsboro Nine"...

Black Bodies.
July 1, 2002... by Jules Allen Delano Greenidge Editions, April 2002 $24.95, ISBN 0-929-44514-7 Photographer Jules Allen originally planned for his first major book of images to be about boxing. But with a slight change of plans, his unblinking lens...

Shakers of St. Vincent.
July 1, 2002... Edited by Bradford Keeney, Ph.D., photographs by Kern L. Nickerson Ringing Rocks Press in association with Leete's Island Books, June 2002 $39.95, ISBN 0-918-17233-0 On the hilly and lush island of St. Vincent, one of the Windward Islands...

An Anthology of African Art: The Twentieth Century.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... edited by N'Gone Fall and Jean Loup Pivin D.A.P./Editions Revue Noire, May 2002 $80.00, ISBN 1-891-02438-8 To understand modern art is to appreciate intellectually, if not emotionally, the profound influence that African art has had on an...

Role reversal: Hollywood writers take their act from print to screen and vice versa.
July 1, 2002... The book was fine, but it wasn't as good as the movie." How often have you heard that? Exactly. On the other hand, the book-to-movie lament is by now so familiar that it's a wonder studios return to the literary well at all. Among screen...

Summertime and the reading is easy.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Close your eyes and picture yourself lolling comfortably in a chaise lounge on fine, white sand, the crystal-clear, blue ocean gently lapping the shore just a few yards away. Warm gentle breezes caress your body and the sun seems to kiss your...

Bad Boy Brawly Brown.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Walter Mosley Little, Brown & Co., July 2002 $24.95, ISBN 0-316-07301-6 After being missing-in-action for six long years, Easy Rawlins is back on the literary scene in Bad Boy Brawly Brown. In his latest novel, Walter Mosley employs...

The Black Sleuth.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by John Edward Bruce, edited by John Cullen Gruesser Northeastern University Press, June 2002 $18.95, ISBN 1-555-53511-9 John Edward Bruce's The Black Sleuth was first serialized in McGirt's Magazine, a serial started in 1907, making Bruce...

Interesting Women.
July 1, 2002... by Andrea Lee Random House, April 2002 $22.95, ISBN 0-375-50586-5 The first short story in Andrea Lee's breathtaking new collection, Interesting Women, is becoming as notorious as the surprise ending in an independent movie. One thinks of...

His Insignificant Other.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Karen V. Siplin The Free Press, June 2002 $23.00, ISBN 0-743-22278-4 With temperatures soaring to 100 degrees, a day at the beach is in order. All that's left to decide is what to bring to read. His Insignificant Other may be just what...

Blue Lights in the Basement.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Juliet Sandford Loudmouth Entertainment & Publishing Inc., September 2001 $24.95, ISBN 0-971-41870-5 Just as I was about to concede that witty and provocative black novels are a thing of the past--Pearl Cleage's work, of course, being...

Getting Our Breath Back.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Shawne Johnson Dutton, June 2002 $22.95, ISBN 0-525-94654-3 Shawne Johnson's debut novel, Getting Our Breath Back, chronicles the lives of three sisters and the impact of growing up in North Philadelphia during the 1960s' Civil Rights...

Dream in Color.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Darlene Johnson Villard, July 2002 $13.95, ISBN 0-375- 75841-0 At age 25, Victoria Jordan seems to have it all--at least on the surface. She is married. She's a mother. And she has a good job. Yet Victoria's marriage is not what she'd...

Mr. Potter.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Jamaica Kincaid Farrar, Stratus and Giroux, May 2002 $20.00, ISBN 0-374-21494-8 Jamaica Kincaid seems to be working her way through her family tree, and those of us who appreciate great writing pray she never runs out of relatives. ...

Cubicles.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Camika Spencer Villard, July 2002 $21.95, ISBN 0.375-50340-4 A familiar story line with a twist is the best way to describe Camika Spencer's latest novel, Cubicles, the follow-up to her originally self-published debut, When All Hell...

Married but Still Looking.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Travis Hunter Villard Books, May 2002 $21.95, ISBN 0-375-50569-5 Relative newcomer Travis Hunter has developed an uncanny knack for creating characters that readers immediately love to hate. Hunter's new book, with its somewhat...

Harlem Redux.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Persia Walker Simon & Schuster, June 2002 $22.00, ISBN 0-743-22497-30 "A lot's done happened since you been gone," is something of an understatement in a line from Harlem Redux Four years after dropping out of Harlem society, civil...

I'm Telling.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Karen E. Quinones Miller Simon & Schuster, July 2002 $23.00, ISBN 0-743-21435-8 Karen E. Quinones Miller launched her literary career with her self-published novel Satin Doll, which was picked up and released by Simon & Schuster last...

The Portable Promised Land.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Toure Little, Brown and Company, July 2002 $23.95, ISBN 0-316-66643-2 Welcome to Soul City! Jump in your Steviewondermobile and head over to the Church of Kentucky Fried Souls where the Revren Daddy Love's sermons leave you yearning for...

Testimony.(Brief Review)
July 1, 2002... by Felicia Mason Dafina, June 2002 $24.00, ISBN 0-758-20059-5 The members of the Triumphant Voices of Praise gospel choir have not yet proven they are worthy in their leader Roger McKenzie's eyes. To make matters worse, conflicts among...

Love the One You're With.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by James Earl Hardy Amistad, June 2002 $22.95, ISBN 0-066-21248-0 If someone accused best-selling novelist James Earl Hardy of knowing a good thing when he sees it, they would probably be right. The talented writer's latest novel, Love the...

A Conversation with the Mann.
July 1, 2002... by John Ridley Warner Books, June 2002 $24.95, ISBN 0-446-52836-6 From John Ridley, the multi-hyphenated Hollywood talent (see feature on page 24), you might expect a less than literary effort in this his fourth novel. After all, for...

Leaving Atlanta.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Tayari Jones AOL Time Warners Books, August 2002 $23.95, ISBN 0-446-52830-7 You don't have to be African American to enjoy and be saddened by Tasha, Rodney, and Octavia, three children who struggle under the specter of the 1980's...

May December Souls.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Marissa Monteilh Avon, March 2002 $13.95, ISBN 0-060-00732-X The big 4-0 is just around the corner for Mariah Pijeaux. Her dream of becoming a journalist are not being realized as she languishes in her job as a temporary assistant in...

Perfecting Timing.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Brenda Jackson Dafina, May 2002 $24.00, ISBN 0-575-66921-8 Maxine Chandler and Mya Rivers have been best friends since childhood. Yet distance and misunderstandings have changed their relationship. Now their class reunion has brought...

Brown Glass Windows.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Devorah Major Curbstone Press, May 2002 $15.95, ISBN 1-880-68487-X Life in San Francisco isn't all that great for the Everman family. Ranger, the son, has allowed the horror of Vietnam and his drug addiction to ruin his marriage and his...

Promises To Keep.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Gloria Mallette Strivers Row, June 2002 $13.95, ISBN 0-375-75744-9 Troy Kirkwood is a devoted father and son trying to move forward with his life after a bitter divorce. When he suddenly disappears, his family knows something is...

Omar Tyree raw and uncut: the self-described "Urban Griot" hopes to cultivate more black male readers with his next novel Leslie. (Cover Story).
July 1, 2002... On a warm April night, the Love Jones fallout ripples through a New York City night-club where several wannabes have come hoping to be discovered. Credit three things to Love Jones--that mid-90s movie of buppie-love--a bangin' soundtrack,...

Spirituality and the Sisters.(two books on women and religion)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Life Changing Relationships: Bad Boys, Bad Girls by Rev. James T. Meeks Moody Press, February 2002 $9.99, ISBN 0-802-42994-7 Victory in Singleness: A Strategy for Emotional Peace by Valerie & Jerome Clayton Moody Press, 2002 $12.99, ISBN...

John A. Williams: A Writer Beyond `isms.
July 1, 2002... Written by Robert Fleming Photography by Anthony Barboza At 76, John A. Williams, considered by many to be one of the finest writers of his generation, continues to produce highly original, provocative works despite the publishing...

The Pact: Three Young Men Make a Promise and Fulfill a Dream.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Drs. Sampson Davis, George Jenkins and Rameck Hunt with Lisa Frazier Page Riverhead Books, June 2002 $24.95, ISBN 1-573-22216-X Growing up is tough. But growing up in Newark, a city recently ranked one of the worst places in the country...

Yet a Stranger: Why Black Americans Still Don't Feel at Home.
July 1, 2002... by Deborah Mathis AOL Time Warner Book Group, May 2002 $23.95, ISBN 0-446-52636-3 The publication of books about the race problem in America often seems as ceaseless as the problem itself. In a way that is a pity, since each new book has a...

Spike Lee: Interviews.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... edited by Cynthia Fuchs University Press of Mississippi, May 2002 $18.00, ISBN 1-578-06470-8 There's nothing new in the idea of documenting an artist and the creative forces that define a certain time. Still, when new generations come of...

The Origins of African-American Literature: 1680-1865.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Dickson D. Bruce Jr. The University Press of Virginia December 2001 $19.50, ISBN 0-813-92067-1 The earliest black writers believed in the "power of literature to change minds," says Dickson D. Bruce Jr., in his thoughtful study of the...

Shaded Lives: African-American Women and Television.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Beretta E. Smith-Shomade Rutgers University Press, July 2002 $20.00 paperback, ISBN 0-813-53105-5 $60.00 hardcover, ISBN 0-813-53104-7 In Shaded Lives, Beretta E. Smith-Shomade looks at the under-examined issue of the image of black...

Sister Circle: Black Women and Work.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Edited by Sharon Harley and The Black Women and Work Collective Rutgers University Press, July 2002 $22.00 paperback, ISBN 0-813-53061-X Born out of informal meetings over potluck dinners beginning in 1993, Sister Circle is the product of a...

Out There: Mavericks of Black Literature.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Darryl Pinckney Basic Civitas Books, June 2002 $25.00, ISBN 0-465-05760-8 African-American literature is filled with writers who labored in obscurity, only to be remembered years later as writers who wrote through pain and struggle to...

The art of black writers collectives.
July 1, 2002... Black writers have always known the importance of community, even though many write in isolation. For some, though, writers' collectives provide a way to connect with their community while offering an important link to fellow authors. Although...

Celebrity publishers. (self-publishing).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... There's not much difference between writing a book and writing rhymes. Rhymes are a reflection of life and so are the types of books I write. Even though they're considered fiction, I write about things that people go through for real... in...

Situations: A Book of Short Stories.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Lunise "QueenPen" Walters QP Publications, January 2002 $15.00, ISBN 0-971-42460-8 From hip hop to "reality" fiction A collection of eight urban stories, Situations is the kind of real-life account that many readers can relate to....

The Book of K-III: The Contemporary Poetics of Kene Holliday.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Kene Holliday Milligan Books, December 1998 $13.95, ISBN 1-881-52442-6 Actor turns author Kene Holliday, who spent many years on television and performing in the theater, is probably best known for his role as Tyler Hudson on...

Firefighter.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Herman Williams with James Hall Mountain Movers Press/Hay House, February 2002 $23.95, ISBN 1-588-25006-7 Family ties Emmy Award-winner Montel Williams, host of The Montel Williams Show, has published several of his own works under...

Ask the book doctor.(internet book publishing resources)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Dear Dr. Rosie, Just how important is it for self-published authors to have an Internet presence, and what are ways I can market my books on the Internet? Last, but not least, what does it cost for a basic website? Dear Author, ...

What every poet should know about copyright. (poetic license).(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... No one word is more misused or misunderstood within the written and spoken-word communities than the term "copyright." For writers, this single word creates more confusion and lends itself to more misinterpretation than the most perplexing...

Sleeping with the Dictionary.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Harryette Mullen University of California Press February 2002 $14.95, ISBN 0-520-23143-0 Contrived yet not overly predictable, Harryette Mullen's Sleeping With the Dictionary is a poetic exploration of language and linguistics from its...

House of Women.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Gwendolyn A. Mitchell Third World Press November 2001 $16.00, ISBN 0-883-78222-7 House of Women is a delicate book, a window into life's episodes plain and simple. This portrayal of simplicity, the naked almost invisible meaning of our...

Love Lingers.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Linda Dominique Grosvenor Sardorian Publications Summer 2002 $12.95, ISBN 0-970-01026-5 Linda Dominique Grosvenor opens Love Lingers with a preface: "... love is a really viable emotion that cannot be caged or limited." But a survey of...

Why the Woman Is Singing on the Corner: A Verse Narrative.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Dolores Kendrick Peter Randall Publisher, February 2002 $16.95, ISBN 1-931-80700-0 Dolores Kendrick carefully peels back layers of memory, in the verse narrative Why the Woman Is Singing on the Corner. This beautiful, haunting, somewhat...

A Writer's guide to self-publishing.
July 1, 2002... The challenge facing most self-published authors is in balancing the business demands of a publisher with the creative drive that's in each author. Often, self-published authors must wear many hats--designer, accountant, sales rep, publicist...

Walking away with the best deal.(self-publishing tips)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... In 1995, Michael Baisden's career as a self-published author began with a trade paperback book entitled Never Satisfied, How and Why Men Cheat. The relationship book, told from a man's perspective, was well received by female readers. Baisden...

The Three Billygoats Gruff and Mean Calypso Joe.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Catherine Valente Youngquist, Illustrated by Kristen Sorra Atheneum, June 2002, $16.00, ISBN 0-689-82824-1 A successful retelling of a fable requires confidence and imagination. Author Cathrene Valente Youngquist pairs both with a...

Looking for Red.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Anna Johnson Simon & Schuster, May 2002 $15.95, ISBN 0-689-83253-2 Looking for Red is a spooky tale about a young boy who mysteriously disappears. Red, 15, an adventurous soul who loved escaping to the ocean near the Massachusetts town...

Our Gracie Aunt.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Jacqueline Woodson, Illustrations by Jon J. Muth Hyperion Books, June 2002 $15.99, ISBN 0-786-80620-6 Johnson and Beebee don't know what to make of their mother. "Sometimes Mama went away for a day. Sometimes for a lot of days." One...

Double Dutch.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... Sharon Draper's real-life experience as a teacher informs her stories about troubled teens. In her latest novel, Double Dutch, the two-time Coretta Scott King Award-winning author addresses how painfully important appearances are to young...

Fresh Girl.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Jaira Placide Wendy Lamb Books, March 2002 $15.95, ISBN 0-385-32753-6 When a coup d' etat erupts in Haiti, American-born Mardi Desravines flees the country to rejoin her parents in Brooklyn. Raised in Haiti since she was four, Mardi...

Jazz Baby.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Carole Boston Weatherford, Illustrated by Laura Freeman Lee & Low Books, April 2002 $11.95, ISBN 1-584-30039-6 Carole Boston Weatherford's Jazz Baby brings to life in poetry the rhythms, beats and instruments that create finger-snappin',...

My Sisters' Voices: Teenage Girls of Color Speak Out.(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... by Iris Jacob Henry Holt, April 2002 $13.00, ISBN 0-805-06821-X After Iris Jacob, a biracial 18-year-old, read a couple books about teenage girls and their coming-of-age experiences, she was disappointed. "I felt my experience had not been...

Sosu's Call.(Children's Review)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2002... written and illustrated by Meshack Asare Kane/Miller, March 2002 $15.95, ISBN 1-929-13221-2 In this inspiring picture book, Ghanaian author and illustrator Meshack Asare tells the story of Sosu, a disabled African boy who saves his village...

Ann Lane Petry. (tribute).
July 1, 2002... The first time I read Ann Petry's novel The Street was in 1985, shortly after I had moved to Harlem. Within a few days of settling in to my apartment in a four-story walk-up, I plunged into the novel. So familiar was the setting that a young...