“Radiant.” —O, The Oprah MagazineFrom cherished memories of childhood weekends with Nana to the reality of the year she spent “ladysitting,” Lorene Cary journeys through stories of their time together and five generations of their African American family. Weaving a narrative of her complicated relationship with Nana—a fiercely independent and often stubborn woman whose family fled the Jim Crow South and who managed her own business until 100—Cary captures ...

In 1972 Lorene Cary, a bright, ambitious black teenager from Philadelphia, was transplanted into the formerly all-white, all-male environs of the elite St. Paul's School in New Hampshire, where she became a scholarship student in a "boot camp" for future American leaders. Like any good student, she was determined to succeed. But Cary was also determined to succeed without selling out. This wonderfully frank and perceptive memoir describes the perils and ambiguities of that double role, in ...

Four women, lifelong friends, are turning 40--and what a year it is.Roz, the perfectly controlled (and controlling) politician's wife, is trying to keep her family together as she recovers from breast cancer and her husband runs for the biggest election of his career. Though he has strayed from her in the past, she has always been there for him--but all that is in jeopardy now that she has learned he has been sleeping with one of her three best friends.Tam has been avoiding...

**An intimate, gripping novel of the antebellum Underground Railroad, based on the true story of a valiant Philadelphia freedwoman—a debut novel from the author of the “stunning memoir” Black Ice (New York Times)."A stunning achievement ... a deeply engrossing story." —The Philadelphia Inquirer**With *Price of a Child—*the story of Ginnie Pryor (cook, mistress and servant to a Virginia planter) and her struggle with slavery in 1855—Lorene Cary con...

“An absorbing and moving tale” (Publishers Weekly)—a uniquely American story of the consequences of past decisions on present realities through the narrative of a Black family in Philadelphia rediscovering their roots in South Carolina.After World War II, the Needham family moved north to Philadelphia from South Carolina, leaving behind the tragic injustice surrounding the violent death of their patriarch, King. His devoted widow, Selma, r...

In 1972 Lorene Cary, a bright, ambitious black teenager from Philadelphia, was transplanted into the formerly all-white, all-male environs of the elite St. Paul's School in New Hampshire, where she became a scholarship student in a "boot camp" for future American leaders. Like any good student, she was determined to succeed. But Cary was also determined to succeed without selling out. This wonderfully frank and perceptive memoir describes the perils and ambiguities of that double role, in ...

If Sons, Then Heirs sheds light on a uniquely American, largely untold story of African American land ownership, the outmigration from the South, racial violence, and the consequences of past decisions on present realities.After World War II, Needham family members migrated north to Philadelphia from South Carolina, leaving behind the tragic injustice surrounding the violent death of their patriarch, King. His devoted widow, Selma, remains on the old home place. Over the y...