Summer Reads

Elliott E. Connie is a psychotherapist in Keller, Texas, known for helping couples, families, and thousands of individuals apply solution-focused approaches to help them solve their problems and work toward their desired futures. Change Your Questions, Change Your Future: Overcome Challenges and Create a New Vision for Your Life Using the Principles of Solution Focused Brief Therapy is a guide for readers to learn to ask themselves the right questions to create a new vision for their future. In this book, readers are provided with the tools, knowledge, and confidence to apply Solution-Focused Brief Therapy principles, which will shift their perspective based on Connie’s research, case studies, and success stories. Solution-Focused Brief Therapy is a goal-focused therapeutic approach that emphasizes the client's strengths and resources to enhance positive change. Connie, along with Adam Froerer, teaches individuals that getting honest and asking the right questions enables them to create a new vision for their future.

Danielle Allen is a novelist, educator, and life coach best known for her contemporary romance novels. Last year, she released Curvy Girl Summer (Curve, 1), and this year, she released the second installment of the Curve series. Curvy Girl Summer (Curve 1) is about a young woman dealing with the pressures of dating and settling down. Aaliyah James knows she has moved past casual hookups, flings, and situationships. With pressure from her family about being too big in personality and physically, she is determined to prove them wrong and step out at her huge 30th birthday celebration with a boyfriend. When a blind date goes wrong, Aaliyah finds herself chatting at a bar with the local bartender, Ahmed, who suggests that she try a dating app, but little does she know, her match could be closer than she thinks.

That’s How They Get You: An Unruly Anthology of Black American Humor is a collection of Black humor from some of the most acclaimed authors and performers. Readers can expect from this book a collection of the best, funniest, and Blackest essays, short stories, letters, and rants. The collection features material from Nicola Yoon, Wyatt Cenac, Roy Woods, and Hanif Abdurraqib, just to name a few. Damon Young is a writer, critic, humorist, and co-founder and editor-in-chief of VerySmartBrothas. Young's debut book, What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker, won the Thurber Prize for American Humor. He has gained praise for his work from many of his peers, such as Ava DuVernay and Michael Eric Dyson.

Toni Morrison is renowned for her groundbreaking work as an author and has been widely celebrated for her literary achievements and cultural impact, but many people don't know about her work and impact as an editor. Toni at Random: The Iconic Writer’s Legendary Editorship gives readers more depth into the work Morrison did in her career. During her time at Random House, where she became its most important editor, Morrison redefined the literary landscape. She worked with authors such as Toni Cade Bambara and Leon Forrest and helped cultural icons Angela Davis and Muhammad Ali tell their stories. Morrison had great enthusiasm for author Dana Williams with this book; she shared memories and thoughts with her and gave Williams the title of the book as well. Williams is Professor of African American literature and Dean of the Graduate School at Howard University. She is the author of In the Light of Likeness Transformed: The Literary Art of Leon Forrest and has had her work published in journals such as African American Review and the Langston Hughes Review.