Young Adult Books by Black Authors
- by Shelly Page
- Teen LGBTQ+ Fiction, Teen LGBTQ+ Romance, Teen Romance, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2026
A teen mystic will do anything to solve a series of love-related magical mishaps plaguing her high school, including fake dating her boss’s daughter, in this charming sapphic romance. Magic...
- by Jumata Emill
- Teen LGBTQ+ Fiction, Teen Mysteries & Detective, Teen Thrillers, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2026
A teen investigative podcaster decides to dig into the truth behind a grisly murder spree that rocked his hometown five years ago, but soon discovers that this cold case is...
- by Alechia Dow
- Teen Fantasy, Teen LGBTQ+ Romance, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2026
A cozy, romantic fantasy from award-winning author Alechia Dow. Darling is the most talented―and unusual―Guardian to get a chance at winning the coveted once-in-a-generation Mortal Outcome Council mentorship. Getting the...
- by Shelly Page
- Teen Fantasy Romance, Teen LGBTQ+ Romance, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2025
A cozy sapphic romantasy about a teen witch trying to keep her family’s apothecary up and running, with a little help from her ex-best friend—and first crush. Plant witch Sage...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2025
In this debut speculative YA mystery, a Black teen with premonition-like powers must solve her friend’s disappearance before she finds herself in the same danger, perfect for fans of Ace...
- Young Adult Nonfiction
- Publication Year: 2025
No matter how young you are or where you’re starting from, you are a future millionaire. Declare it. Know it. Demand it. And, with help from bestselling author and self-made...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2024
After her private school is rocked by a gruesome murder, a teen tries to find the real killer and clear her brother’s name in this “creepily potent story of a...
- Teen Civil & Human Rights, Young Adult Nonfiction
- Publication Year: 2024
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of This Book Is Anti-Racist and The Antiracist Kid, Tiffany Jewell, this YA nonfiction book, highlighting inequities Black and Brown students face...
- by Kamilah Cole
- Fantasy, LGBTQ+ Fiction, Teen Fantasy, Teen LGBTQ+ Fiction, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2024
Whip-smart and immersive, this Jamaican-inspired fantasy follows a gods-blessed heroine who’s forced to choose between saving her sister or protecting her homeland—perfect for fans of Iron Widow and The Priory...
- by Renée Watson
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2024
A thoughtful celebration of Black girlhood by award-winning author and poet Renée Watson. In this semi-autobiographical collection of poems, Renée Watson writes about her experience growing up as a young...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2024
Part memoir, part speculative fiction, this novel explores the often surreal experience of growing up as a mixed-Black transracial adoptee. Dream Country author Shannon Gibney returns with a new book...
- Teen Fantasy, Teen Sword & Sorcery Fantasy, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2024
A romantic standalone fantasy set in the world of Raybearer, from New York Times bestselling author Jordan Ifueko. The smallest spark can bind two hearts . . . or start...
- Teen Dystopian, Teen Fantasy, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2024
In a country divided between humans and witchers, Venus Stoneheart hustles as a brewer making illegal love potions to support her family. Love potions is a dangerous business. Brewing has...
- by Namina Forna
- Middle School, Teen Fantasy, Teen Sword & Sorcery Fantasy, Young Adult
- Publication Year: 2024
The dazzling finale to the groundbreaking, New York Times bestselling Gilded Ones series. One girl holds the power to defeat the gods—but can she become one? Mere weeks after confronting...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2023
All it took was one night and one bad decision for fifteen-year-old Violetta Chen-Samuels’ life to go off the rails. After driving drunk and causing the accident that kills her...
- Teen Thrillers, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2023
She is the reason no one goes in the water. And she will make them pay. Bronwyn is only supposed to be in rural Hillwoods for a year. Her grandmother...
- Teen Contemporary Romance, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2023
From Talia Hibbert, the bestselling author of the Brown Sisters trilogy, comes a laugh-out-loud story about a quirky content creator and a clean-cut athlete testing their abilities to survive the...
- Teen Fantasy, Teen Thrillers, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
Mysterious disappearances. An urban legend rumored to be responsible. And one group of friends determined to save their city at any cost. For over a year, the Bronx has been...
- Middle School, Teen Fantasy, Teen Prejudice and Racism, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
Meet Naema Bradshaw: a beautiful Eloko, once Portland-famous, now infamous, as she navigates a personal and public reckoning where confronting the limits of her privilege will show Naema what her...
- by Namina Forna
- Middle School, Teen Fantasy, Teen Sword & Sorcery Fantasy, Young Adult
- Publication Year: 2022
The epic, hotly anticipated sequel to the instant bestseller The Gilded Ones about a girl with the power to remake her world—or destroy it. It’s been six months since Deka...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
Six critically acclaimed, bestselling, and award-winning authors bring the glowing warmth and electricity of Black teens in love to this charming, hilarious, and heartwarming novel that shines a bright light...
- Short Stories, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
High Spirits is a collection of eleven interconnected short stories from the Dominican diaspora, from debut author Camille Gomera-Tavarez. It is a book centered on one extended family – the...
- Poetry, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
A teen girl hiding the scars of a past relationship finds home and healing in the words of strong Black writers. A beautiful sophomore novel from critically acclaimed author and...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
From New York Times bestselling author Ashley Woodfolk, Nothing Burns as Bright as You is an impassioned stand-alone tale of queer love, grief, and the complexity of female friendship. Two...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
From National Book Award finalist Akwaeke Emezi comes a companion novel to the critically acclaimed PET that explores both the importance and cost of social revolution—and how youth lead the...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2022
From the moment Sunny Nwazue discovered she had mystical energy flowing in her blood, she sought to understand and control her powers. Throughout her adventures in Akata Witch and Akata...
- Young Adult Nonfiction
- Publication Year: 2022
They tell me to “fix” my hair. And by fix, they mean straighten, they mean whiten; but how do you fix this shipwrecked history of hair? In her most famous...
- Middle School, Teen Fantasy, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2021
A captivating modern fantasy about Black sirens, friendship, and self-discovery set against the challenges of today’s racism and sexism. In a society determined to keep her under lock and key,...
- by Nicola Yoon
- Teen Contemporary Romance, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2021
In this romantic page-turner from the author of Everything, Everything and The Sun is Also a Star, Evie has the power to see other people’s romantic fates—what will happen when...
- Short Stories, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2021
A group portrait of young adults enmeshed in desire and violence, a hotly charged, deeply satisfying new work of fiction from the author of Booker Prize finalist Real Life In...
- by Namina Forna
- Middle School, Teen Fantasy, Teen Sword & Sorcery Fantasy, Young Adult
- Publication Year: 2021
The start of a bold and immersive fantasy series about identity, power, and rebellion, following a girl recruited into a deadly army after being cast out of her village. Sixteen-year-old...
- Young Adult Nonfiction
- Publication Year: 2020
“We don’t see color.” “I didn’t know Black people liked Star Wars!” “What hood are you from?” As a student in a largely white high school, Frederick Joseph often simply...
- by Leah Johnson
- LGBTQ+ Fiction, Teen LGBTQ+ Fiction, Teen LGBTQ+ Romance, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2020
Liz Lighty has always believed she’s too black, too poor, too awkward to shine in her small, rich, prom-obsessed midwestern town. But it’s okay — Liz has a plan that...
- Poetry, Young Adult
- Publication Year: 2020
From award-winning author Zetta Elliott comes a stirring and powerful poetry collection that reveals the beauty, danger, and magic found at the intersection of race and gender. Inspired by the...
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2019
Co-written by sisters Maika and Maritza Moulite, this exceptional debut novel captures a sparkling new voice and irrepressible heroine in a story sure to thrill fans of Nicola Yoon and...
- Teen Contemporary Romance, Young Adult
- Publication Year: 2019
A debut young adult rom-com about an African American ballerina who finds love on the road to an audition. “In a world where it’s easy to lose faith in love,...
- by Ibi Zoboi
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2018
In this stunning debut novel, Pushcart-nominated author Ibi Zoboi draws on her own experience as a young Haitian immigrant, infusing this lyrical exploration of America with magical realism and vodou...
- by Tomi Adeyemi
- Teen Fantasy, Teen Legends, Teen Prejudice and Racism, Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2018
With five starred reviews, Tomi Adeyemi’s West African-inspired fantasy debut, and instant #1 New York Times Bestseller, conjures a world of magic and danger, perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo...
- by Angie Thomas
- Young Adult, Young Adult Fiction
- Publication Year: 2017
Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when...