Nigerians in Space


Deji Bryce Olukotun - 2013
    Houston. Dr. Wale Olufunmi, lunar rock geologist, has a life most Nigerian immigrants would kill for, but then most Nigerians aren’t Wale—-a great scientific mind in exile with galactic ambitions. Then comes an outlandish order: steal a piece of the moon. With both personal and national glory at stake, Wale manages to pull off the near impossible, setting out on a journey back to Nigeria that leads anywhere but home. Compelled by Wale’s impulsive act, Nigerians traces arcs in time and space from Houston to Stockholm, from Cape Town to Bulawayo, picking up on the intersecting lives of a South African abalone smuggler, a freedom fighter’s young daughter, and Wale’s own ambitious son. Deji Bryce Olukotun’s debut novel defies categorization—-a story of international intrigue that tackles deeper questions about exile, identity, and the need to answer an elusive question: what exactly is brain gain?PRAISE FOR NIGERIANS IN SPACE "Fast-paced, well-written and packed with insight and humor. Olukotun is a very talented storyteller. "—-Charles Yu, National Book Award 5-Under-35 winner and author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe"A deft mingling of satirical humor, Noirish twists…and a keen-eyed yet accessible take on cultural displacement in contemporary times. "—-Olufemi Terry, winner of the Caine Prize for African Writing"You can taste Cape Town, you can hear it in the dialogue, see its beauty in the descriptions. Deji Olukotun has my city's number: especially its nasty underbelly, the dangerous dealing of abalone poachers. "—-Mike Nicol, author of the Revenge Trilogy

Feathers of Snow: A Goose Girl Retelling


Alice Ivinya - 2021
    If the prince finds out, her life will be forfeit and her country plunged into war.But there is more to the icy prince than meets the eye, and Brianna slowly unravels the secrets of his dark past while surviving in a strange culture.However her goodness and wit will only get her so far. Terrifying beasts stalk the border and a murderer is at work in the town. They know the truth of Brianna’s identity and will stop at nothing to destroy all she has fought for.

The Last Fallen Star


Graci Kim - 2021
    Her sister, Hattie, will earn her Gi bracelet and finally be able to cast spells without adult supervision. Although Riley is desperate to follow in her sister's footsteps when she herself turns thirteen, she's a saram--a person without magic. Riley was adopted, and despite having memorized every healing spell she's ever heard, she often feels like the odd one out in her family and the gifted community.Then Hattie gets an idea: what if the two of them could cast a spell that would allow Riley to share Hattie's magic? Their sleuthing reveals a promising incantation in the family's old spell book, and the sisters decide to perform it at Hattie's initiation ceremony. If it works, no one will ever treat Riley as an outsider again. It's a perfect plan!Until it isn't. When the sisters attempt to violate the laws of the Godrealm, Hattie's life ends up hanging in the balance, and to save her Riley has to fulfill an impossible task: find the last fallen star. But what even is the star, and how can she find it?As Riley embarks on her search, she finds herself meeting fantastic creatures and collaborating with her worst enemies. And when she uncovers secrets that challenge everything she has been taught to believe, Riley must decide what it means to be a witch, what it means to be family, and what it really means to belong.

The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea


Maggie Tokuda-Hall - 2020
    For Flora, former starving urchin, the brutal life of a pirate is about survival: don’t trust, don’t stick out, and don’t feel. But on this voyage, as the pirates prepare to sell their unsuspecting passengers into slavery, Flora is drawn to the Lady Evelyn Hasegawa, who is en route to a dreaded arranged marriage with her own casket in tow. Flora doesn’t expect to be taken under Evelyn’s wing, and Evelyn doesn’t expect to find such a deep bond with the pirate Florian. Soon the unlikely pair set in motion a wild escape that will free a captured mermaid (coveted for her blood, which causes men to have visions and lose memories) and involve the mysterious Pirate Supreme, an opportunistic witch, and the all-encompassing Sea itself.

Songs of Insurrection


J.C. Kang - 2016
    With alliances to build and ambitious lords to placate, they care more about her marriage prospects than her voice.Only the handsome Prince Hardeep, a foreign martial mystic, recognizes her potential. Convinced Kaiya will rediscover the legendary but perilous art of invoking magic through music, he suggests her voice, not her marriage, might better serve the realm.When members of the emperor’s elite spy clan-- Kaiya’s childhood friend Tian and his half-elf sidekick (or maybe he’s her sidekick?)-- discover mere discontent boiling over into full-scale rebellion, Kaiya must choose. Obediently wedding the depraved ringleader means giving up her music. Confronting him with the growing power of her voice could kill her.

Binding Shadows


Jasmine Silvera - 2020
     Hunting down lost books is more than a job, it’s a way for Barbara to conceal her powers in the mundane world of the university library. One misstep and she risks exposure to ruthless necromancers willing to destroy anything supernatural they cannot control. But when the prickly new professor in charge of her latest assignment proves more than he seems, rules and reason are no match for her growing fascination. After years of battling to cage the beast within him, Tobias returns to Prague and the safety of his pack of brothers. Unfortunately, his new job handling a collection of rare editions comes with a research assistant irresistible to both beast and man. Revealing his secret could endanger his entire family and he refuses to risk passing on the curse in his blood. When the discovery of an enchanted book of spells triggers unpredictable surges in Barbara’s magic, unleashing the beast within himself may be the only way to free her. Trapped between a witch and a necromancer, they must survive a perilous reckoning with the past, or neither will have a future. Binding Shadows is the first book in the Tooth & Spell Trilogy and is as a prequel to Death's Dancer.

The Black God's Drums


P. Djèlí Clark - 2018
    Instead, she wants to soar, and her sights are set on securing passage aboard the smuggler airship Midnight Robber. Her ticket: earning Captain Ann-Marie’s trust using a secret about a kidnapped Haitian scientist and a mysterious weapon he calls The Black God’s Drums.But Creeper keeps another secret close to heart--Oya, the African orisha of the wind and storms, who speaks inside her head and grants her divine powers. And Oya has her own priorities concerning Creeper and Ann-Marie…

My Midnight Moonlight Valentine


J.J. McAvoy - 2020
    Ever since her rebirth a year ago, she’s done her best to live a quiet, peaceful life as an art conservator and restorationist at The National Gallery of Art. All she wants is to blend in with the humans.However that all gets thrown out the window one night while hunting in Great Falls Park, where Druella comes across a naked vampire with no memory of how he got there, or the last century for that matter. All he seems to be sure of is that she is his soulmate…and he won’t leave without her.

Green Heart


Alice Hoffman - 2012
    Struggling to survive in a place where nothing seems to grow and ashes are everywhere, Green retreats into the ruined realm of her garden. But in destroying her feelings, she also begins to destroy herself. It is only through a series of mysterious encounters that Green relearns the lessons of love and begins to heal as she tells her own story.As she heals, Green lives every day with feelings of loss. Her family is gone, the boy she loves is missing, and the world she once knew has been transformed by tragedy. In order to rediscover the truth about love, hope, and magic, she must venture away from her home, collecting the stories of a group of women who have been branded witches for their mysterious powers. Only through their stories will Green find her own heart's desire.

All of Us with Wings


Michelle Ruiz Keil - 2019
    Then one day, she meets Pallas, a precocious twelve-year-old who lives with her rock-star family in one of the city’s storybook Victorians. Xochi accepts a position as Pallas’s live-in governess and quickly finds her place in their household, which is relaxed and happy despite the band's larger-than-life fame.But on the night of the Vernal Equinox, as a concert afterparty rages in the house below, Xochi and Pallas accidentally summon a pair of ancient creatures devoted to avenging the wrongs of Xochi’s adolescence. She would do anything to preserve her new life, but with the creatures determined to exact vengeance on those who’ve hurt her, no one is safe—not the family she’s chosen, nor the one she left behind.

The Kishi


Antoine Bandele - 2018
    They can’t be real, can they?Something has slain a villager, and the locals of Bajok point their fingers at Amana, a pacifist monk running from his dark past. But Amana knows there’s something else, something much darker, lurking in the village.Can he save the village, his name, and his principles? To save one would mean the sacrifice of the others, if he has the strength.

Hex


Mackenzie McGuire - 2015
    A month ago I died along with my two best friends in a car crash. Obviously, my death didn't last long. Since then, I hear voices and the nightmares – don’t even get me started. I just wanted to be normal. That meant leaving my lux L.A. life for the gothic, and icy, Saxton Academy in the mountains of Vermont. Away from the tabloids, I had a plan to get my life together. But that just isn't possible. Thanks to hotties Eli McKinnon and Carden McDowell I discovered my life is a lie. They want to help me reach my potential. I just want to be a regular girl. But darkness is coming, and if I want to stay alive, I may not have a choice.

Djinn


Sang Kromah - 2018
    Truth is, there are certain people, special people, born of this world and of the other, who need that extra protection. They go their entire lives, unaware of the other world, and unaware of the existence of their own personal watcher, watching from afar. But what happens when fate takes a turn for the worse, and The One who needs the aid of a watcher most can’t be found to be protected?Bijou Fitzroy is strange. With the unwanted gift of being an empath, she has spent her entire life as a sheltered recluse, homeschooled by her secretive and overprotective grandmother, who never allows them to stay in one place long enough for Bijou to settle and make friends. When Bijou and her grandmother move to Sykesville and she starts to attend the local high school, Bijou’s world begins to crumble. Town locals begin to disappear and the creatures from her nightmares begin to take shape in her reality. She finds herself at the center of a war she never knew was being fought all around her.

Kingdom at Sea


Jill Williamson - 2016
    As a flock, they sail north into the unknown in hopes of finding land that might become their new home. As the king's illness worsens, Sâr Wilek takes authority over the expedition and struggles to rule the disjointed people, while assassination attempts, vicious serpents, and dark magic endanger his life.One prophecy has come to pass, but another looms dauntingly in the future. Who is this Deliverer? And if the Magonians have him, what might that mean for the realm of Armania?

The Goddess Twins


Yodassa Williams - 2020
    What are you willing to face to discover the truth of who you really are? After years of traveling the world, black identical twins Aurora and Arden think they’ve settled into normalcy in Ohio. But days before their eighteenth birthday, the snarky twins develop powers in telekinesis and telepathy―at the same time that their famous mother, who’s on tour in London, disappears. Searching for answers and determined to rescue her, the sisters unearth truths that threaten to extinguish their bond and demolish their strength as individuals. Can they trust their beguiling, newly discovered British cousins when they barely trust one another? Should they heed the warnings of their immortal grandmother, a Patoi-chatting goddess, who says she’s friendly with The Fates and can see inside a person’s very soul? In order to succeed in their quest, these goddess twins must work together, master their powers, and unveil a horrifying, century-old family mystery. Otherwise, they may not live to see eighteen―or their mother again.