Showing results by publisher "Recorded Books" in Racism & Discrimination

Growing up in 1860s China, Tam Ling Fan has lived a life of comfort. Her father is wealthy enough to provide for his family but unconventional enough to spare Ling Fan from the debilitating foot-binding required of most well-off girls. But Ling Fan’s life is upended when her brother dies of influenza and their father is imprisoned under false accusations. Hoping to earn the money that will secure her father’s release, Ling Fan disguises herself as a boy and takes her brother’s contract to work for the Central Pacific Railroad Company in America.

Growing up in Newark, New Jersey, in the 1930s, Benjy Puterman and Tommy Anspach have always done everything together. It never mattered that Benjy was Jewish and Tommy was of German heritage. But as Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party come to power in Germany and war brews in Europe, everything changes. Tommy is sent to Camp Nordland, a Nazi youth camp for German Americans, where he quickly learns that Jews are the enemy. 

Yolanda Alvarez is having a good year. She’s starting to feel at home Julia De Burgos High, her school in the Bronx. She has her best friend Victory, and maybe something with José, a senior boy she’s getting to know. She’s confident her initiation into her family’s bruja tradition will happen soon. But then a white boy, the son of a politician, appears at Julia De Burgos High, and his vibes are off. And Yolanda’s initiation begins with a series of troubling visions of the violence this boy threatens.

Seventeen-year-old Ginny Park is about to get expelled from high school—again. Stephanie, the picture book author who took Ginny into her Oregon home after she was kicked out of school in Hawaii, isn’t upset: she only wants to know why. But Ginny has always been in-between. She can’t bring herself to open up to anyone about her past, or about what prompted her to flee her native Japan. Then, Ginny finds a mysterious scrawl among Stephanie’s scraps of paper and storybook drawings that changes everything: The sky is about to fall. Where do you go?

Jamal Lawson just wanted to be a part of something. As an aspiring journalist, he packs up his camera and heads to Baltimore to document a rally protesting police brutality after another Black man is murdered. But before the protest even begins, the city implements a new safety protocol: the Dome. The Dome surrounds the city, forcing those inside it to subscribe to a total militarized shutdown. No one can get in, and no one can get out. Alone in a strange place, Jamal doesn’t know where to turn….

Pedro, Luna, and Rafa may attend Fairfax High School together in Los Angeles, but they run in separate spheres. Pedro is often told that he's “too much” and seeks refuge from his home life in a local drag bar. Luna is pretending to go along with the popular crowd but is still grieving the unexpected passing of her beloved cousin Tasha. Then there's Rafa, the quiet new kid who is hiding the fact that his family is homeless.  

With a rocky start to senior year, cheerleaders and lifelong best friends Eleanor and Chanel have a lot on their minds. Eleanor is still in physical therapy months after a serious concussion from a failed cheer stunt. Chanel starts making questionable decisions to deal with the mounting pressure of college applications. But they have each other's backs - just as always, until Eleanor's new relationship with star quarterback Three starts a rift between them.

A girl walks home from school. She's tall for her age. She's wearing her winter coat. Her headphones are in. She's hurrying. She never makes it home. In the aftermath, while law enforcement tries to justify the response, one fact remains: A police officer has shot and killed an unarmed 13-year-old girl. The community is thrown into upheaval, leading to unrest, a growing movement to protest the senseless taking of black lives, and the arrival of white supremacist counter-demonstrators. 

Lena has her killer style, her awesome boyfriend, and a plan. She knows she's going to make it big. Campbell, on the other hand, is just trying to keep her head down and get through the year at her new school. When both girls attend the Friday-night football game, what neither expects is for everything to descend into sudden mass chaos. Chaos born from violence and hate. Chaos that unexpectedly throws them together. They aren't friends. They hardly understand the other's point of view. But none of that matters when the city is up in flames.

When Brooks volunteered to be a stand-in for Burdette's cousin who got stood up for homecoming, it was with the noblest of intentions - helping a fellow human being, free of charge. But when he gets a tip of more than 300 bucks, word spreads quickly and Brooks seizes the opportunity to offer his impeccable escort services to super-wealthy parents who want their daughters to experience those big social events of senior year. So what if along the way he goes along with a few minor deceptions and cuts a few moral corners? What could be the harm?

The summer before that fateful birthday, Maris is in the wealthy beach town of Cross Cove with her estranged father and his new family - and the infamous Duvals. Since the youngest member of the Duval family, Edison, is back from college and back in the arms of Maris' new stepsister, her summer looks to be a long string of lazy days on the Duval's lush beach. But Edison is hiding something. And the more Maris learns about him, the more she's given signs that she should stay as far away from him as possible.

For most of high school, Bijan Majidi has flown under the radar. He gets good grades, reads comics, hangs out with his best friend, Sean, and secretly crushes on Elle, one of the most popular girls in his school. When he's called off the basketball team's varsity bench and makes the winning basket in a playoff game, everything changes in an instant. But not everyone is happy Bijan is the man of the hour: An anonymous cyberbully sends the entire school a picture of Bijan photoshopped to look like a terrorist.   

Seventeen-year-old honors student Coretta White's Tumblr, Little White Lies - her witty thoughts on pretty much...everything - has gone viral. She's got hundreds of thousands of followers; she's even been offered a TV deal. But Coretta has a secret. She hasn't been writing all her own posts. Stressed from the demands of the sudden attention, she hired an expert ghostwriter, 41-year-old Karl Ristoff, to keep the Tumblr going.

One day, 13-year-old Jessie Bollier is earning pennies playing his fife on the docks of New Orleans; the next, he is kidnapped and thrown aboard a slave ship, where his job is to provide music while shackled slaves "dance" to keep their muscles strong and their bodies profitable. As the endless voyage continues, Jessie grows increasingly sickened by the greed, brutality, and inhumanity of the slave trade, but nothing prepares him for the ultimate horror he will witness before his nightmare ends - a horror that will change his life forever.

Yuki Nakahara is an American. But it's the start of World War II, and America doesn't see it that way. Like many other Japanese Americans, Yuki and his family have been forced into an internment camp in the Utah desert. But Yuki isn't willing to sit back and accept this injustice - it's his country, too, and he's going to prove it by enlisting in the army to fight for the Allies.

Sarah Jacqueline Crow and James Holt work in the vast maguey fields that span the bone-dry Southwest, a thirsty, infinite land that is both seductive and fearsome. In this rough, transient landscape, Sarah Jac and James have fallen in love. They're tough and brave, and they have big dreams. Soon they will save up enough money to go east. But until then, they keep their heads down, their muscles tensed, and, above all, their love secret.

After "borrowing" her father's credit card to finance a more stylish wardrobe, Margot Sanchez suddenly finds herself grounded. And by grounded, she means working as an indentured servant in her family's struggling grocery store to pay off her debts. With each order of deli meat she slices, Margot can feel her carefully cultivated prep school reputation slipping through her fingers, and she's willing to do anything to get out of this punishment. Lie, cheat, and maybe even steal.

Life on the Waller plantation is harsh and bleak. Twelve-year-old Sarny knows that it won’t be long before she will be forced to leave Mammy and join the other young women who serve the master’s household as breeders. Then one day a new slave arrives, bought from an overseer for a thousand dollars. He comes in a bad way, walking in front of the horses and Waller’s ready whip. His back is covered with scars as thick as Sarny’s hand, but he holds his head high.

After her father's death, Ruth Robb and her family transplant themselves in the summer of 1958 from New York City to Atlanta - the land of debutantes, sweet tea, and the Ku Klux Klan. In her new hometown, Ruth quickly figures out she can be Jewish or she can be popular, but she can't be both. Eager to fit in with the blonde girls in the "pastel posse", Ruth decides to hide her religion. Before she knows it, she is falling for the handsome and charming Davis and sipping Cokes with him and his friends at the all-white, all-Christian Club.  

The Mahoney brothers are the golden boys of Rutherford Institute. Collins Pruitt is going to ruin them. Theo Mahoney is well-connected and popular. He’s charming and beloved. But he’s hiding something. Jasper Mahoney is lauded for his intellect and athleticism. He’s studious and focused. But he isn’t as impenetrable as he seems. Collins will earn their trust - and then she’ll destroy them. But the closer she gets, the more she questions the reason she was sent to Rutherford in the first place...and if it’s possible to ruin the Mahoneys without also destroying herself.