Morgan and Messiah share many things. Love, hate, lust, trauma, and children. They are bonded forever by the gift of parenthood, but Morgan's attachment to Messiah comes with immense pain. After the discovery of Messiah's condition, Morgan's conflict is intensified. She knows how healing the M&M bubble can be, but she also knows that Messiah has the ability to ruin her. Will Morgan finally take her second chance with her first love? Or will she make the hardest decision of all and let go of the past?

When Michael K. Williams died on September 6, 2021, he left behind a career as one of the most electrifying actors of his generation. From his star turn as Omar Little in The Wire to Chalky White in Boardwalk Empire to Emmy-nominated roles in HBO’s The Night Of and Lovecraft Country, Williams inhabited a slew of indelible roles that he portrayed with a rawness and vulnerability that leapt off the screen.

In 1958 Georgia, the shade of a 13-year-old black girl's skin can make the difference in her fate. Tangy Mae is the smartest of her mother's 10 children, but she is also the darkest complected. The Quinns - all different skin shades, all with unknown fathers - live with their charismatic, beautiful, and tyrannical mother, Rozelle, in poverty on the fringes of a Georgia town where Jim Crow rules. Rozelle's children live in fear of her mood swings and her violence, but they are devoted to her. Rozelle pulls her children out of school when they are 12 years old so that they can help support her by going to work.

Their love was supposed to last forever. But when life delivered blow after devastating blow, Yasmen and Josiah Wade found that love alone couldn’t solve or save everything. It couldn’t save their marriage. Yasmen wasn’t prepared for how her life fell apart, but she’s finally starting to find joy again. She and Josiah have found a new rhythm, co-parenting their two kids and running a thriving business together. Yet like magnets, they’re always drawn back to each other, and now they’re beginning to wonder if they’re truly ready to let go of everything they once had.

Warrior Princess. That’s what Nigeria Jones’s father calls her. He has raised her as part of the Movement, a Black separatist group based in Philadelphia. Nigeria is homeschooled and vegan and participates in traditional rituals to connect her and other kids from the group to their ancestors. But when her mother—the perfect matriarch of their Movement—disappears, Nigeria’s world is upended. She finds herself taking care of her baby brother and stepping into a role she doesn’t want.

After her marriage ends in bitter divorce, all Lorren Jacobs wants is to leave California behind. Returning to her roots in Texas seems to be just what the doctor ordered...until she meets real-life physician Justin Madaris. Lorren has vowed never to give her heart to another man, but she can't stop herself from responding to the handsome widower's sensuous whispers of love. Justin thought no woman could ever move him as deeply as his wife had. Until Lorren.

Raising four very different daughters on her own in rural Arkansas wasn't easy for Miss Pearly Bell. And she's always regretted that the sisters went their separate ways for good - and never wanted to see each other again. But when Pearly is stricken with a terminal illness, she summons them all home - determined to somehow help them get right with each other and forgive.... But that means dealing with past secrets and lies first.

For Zuberi, Uzochi, and Lencho, Nubia is a mystery. Before they were born, a massive storm destroyed their ancestral homeland, forcing their families to flee across the ocean to New York City. Nubia, a utopic island nation off the coast of West Africa, was no more, and their parents’ sorrow was too deep for them to share much of their history beyond the folklore. But New York, ravaged by climate change and class division, is far from a safe haven for refugees, and Nubians live as outcasts.

The daughter of a prostitute mother and an alcoholic father, Maggie Franklin knew her only way out was to marry someone upstanding and church-going. Someone like Hubert Wiggins, the most eligible man in Lexington, Alabama - and the son of its most revered preacher. Proper and prosperous, Hubert is glad to finally have a wife, even one with Maggie's background. For Hubert has a secret he desperately needs to stay hidden. And Maggie's unexpected charm, elegance, and religious devotion makes her the perfect partner in lies....

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to 12 years for a crime Celestial knows he didn't commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding.

The Secret Lives of Church Ladies explores the raw and tender places where Black women and girls dare to follow their desires and pursue a momentary reprieve from being good. The nine stories in this collection feature four generations of characters grappling with who they want to be in the world, caught as they are between the church's double standards and their own needs and passions.

Amaryllis Price, once a relationship destroyer and professional husband stealer, has turned her life around. She's made a vow to live right and walk the straight and narrow, but Amaryllis finds herself at a crossroads when her past catches up with her. She could never resist Charles Walker, and when he reappears in her life, he's even sexier than she remembered. Will she remain celibate and resist the wiles of the devil?

The congregation at the Freedom Temple Church of God in Christ doesn't know what to think when their pastor, Bishop Lance Howell, returns from a vacation in Jamaica with a wife in tow. As if Lady Elect Arykah Miles' false eyelashes, scarlet red fingernails, and fishnet stockings aren't flashy enough, the blond wigs and sky-high stilettos she wears send Mother Gussie Hughes and Mother Pansie Bowak into panic mode.

For the Black woman who suspects she might be an empath, this unique gift can be both a blessing and a burden. In Black Woman Empath, Nya Love, an expert in melanin feminine energy and African Sangomas traditions, offers a comprehensive guide to help Black women empaths embrace their abilities and protect themselves from negative energies that could be harming you daily without your knowledge.

The sudden death of an alcoholic, lying, and manipulative mother sets off a chain of events that forces two worlds to eventually collide, releasing secrets and pain that could change the lives of everyone involved. Janice Williams is finally living the life that she's always dreamed. A respected dean of a university, with an adoring husband, she is finally happy - except for the hole in her heart that remains from a long-ago tragedy. Nicole Henry is enjoying the carefree life of a college student, until her adoptive parents announce they're divorcing and tapped out financially.

Scars and Stilettos: At 13, after being abandoned by her mother one summer and left to take care of her younger brother, Harmony becomes susceptible to a relationship that turns out to be toxic, abusive, and ultimately exploitative. She eventually finds herself working in a strip club at the age of 19, and her boyfriend becomes her pimp, controlling her every move and taking all of her money. Ultimately, she discovers a path to freedom and a whole new life.

The Turners have lived on Yarrow Street for over 50 years. Their house has seen 13 children grown and gone - and some returned; it has seen the arrival of grandchildren, the fall of Detroit's East Side, and the loss of a father. The house still stands despite abandoned lots, an embattled city, and the inevitable shift outward to the suburbs. But now, as ailing matriarch Viola finds herself forced to leave her home and move in with her eldest son, the family discovers that the house is worth just a 10th of its mortgage.

In Michele Andrea Bowen's Up at the College, Yvonne Copeland - dumped by her husband and now homeless - returns to her hometown of Durham, North Carolina. Landing a job as an adjunct professor, she begins rebuilding her life and her relationship with God. And then she meets the university's basketball coach, who's everything she wants in a man - except for a defect only God can change.

Inside a century-old row house in Brooklyn, renegade Sister Evelyn and her fellow nuns preside over a safe haven for the abused and abandoned. Gruff and indomitable on the surface, warm and wry underneath, little daunts Evelyn, until she receives word that Mercy House will be investigated by Bishop Hawkins, a man with whom she shares a dark history. In order to protect everything they’ve built, the nuns must conceal many of their methods, which are forbidden by the Catholic Church.

Fans of T.D. Jakes' Cover Girls will delight in Michelle Stimpson's debut book Boaz Brown. LaShondra Smith has been waiting for a man like Stelson Brown. He is intelligent, funny, and a man of God - but he's white. Can LaShondra get past her prejudices and fears and allow herself to love this man she's always dreamed of?

Venus Johnston has a great job and a long-term, live-in boyfriend who happens to be a drop-dead gorgeous doctor. She also has a weekly beauty-parlor date to keep her long, nappy hair slick and straight. But the tedious hours and harsh chemicals in the salon have long grated on Venus. One frustrating day, she trades in the long hair for a dramatically short, natural cut and sends her commitment-balking boyfriend packing. It's a bold declaration of independence and one that has effects she never could have imagined.

Drought has settled on the town of Peaches, California. The area of the Central Valley where fourteen-year-old Lacey May and her alcoholic mother live was once an agricultural paradise. Now it's an environmental disaster, a place of cracked earth and barren raisin farms. In their desperation, residents have turned to a cult leader named Pastor Vern for guidance. He promises, through secret "assignments," to bring the rain everybody is praying for.

Caroline serves others with little time to enjoy the sweeter parts of life. Until her old boyfriend returns to town - and she's given a second chance at first love. Life hasn't always been so sweet for Caroline Sweeny. She sacrifices her desires for others - unlike her mother who abandoned their family years ago. But when a friend challenges her to accept an exciting job adventure in Spain, Caroline says "yes" to a new destiny. But before she can pack her bags, Caroline suddenly finds herself the new owner of the run-down Frogmore Cafe - and forced to choose: Her friends or her future?

A best-selling author of books for adults and children, Mark Childress pens his most outrageous work yet with Georgia Bottoms. The titular heroine is the epitome of the church-going Southern belle, except for one teeny-tiny aspect of her life. Georgia’s family inheritance has long since evaporated, and to maintain her genteel lifestyle, Miss Bottoms has taken six affluent lovers—the fly in the ointment being that one is a married preacher who’s about to reveal their infidelity to the whole congregation.

Twin sisters Bibike and Ariyike are enjoying a relatively comfortable life in Lagos in 1996. Then their mother loses her job due to political strife, and the family, facing poverty, is drawn into the New Church, an institution led by a charismatic pastor who is not shy about worshipping earthly wealth. Soon Bibike and Ariyike's father wagers the family home on a sure bet that evaporates like smoke.

Growing up in an affluent suburb of New York City, 16-year-old Nevaeh Levitz never thought much about her biracial roots. When her Black mom and Jewish dad split up, she relocates to her mom's family home in Harlem and is forced to confront her identity for the first time. Nevaeh wants to get to know her extended family, but because she inadvertently passes as white, her cousin thinks she's too privileged, pampered, and selfish to relate to the injustices African Americans face on a daily basis.

Sophia Prescott is still mending from the embarrassment of a highly publicized divorce from a pro football player, and the now-single mother is back in Sunset Cove, surrounded by the supporting love of her family and the Sand Queens. Sophia doesn’t think there’s any hope for starting over until an unexpected trip to the pediatrician’s office gives her a second chance after all.

When Caroline Wimbley Levine learns that her mother, Miss Lavinia, has supposedly gone mad, she leaves the big city bustle of Manhattan and returns to Tall Pines Plantation. Caroline originally left Tall Pines to escape her feisty, eccentric mother and her drunken brother, Trip. When Miss Lavinia dies, Caroline is forced to come to terms with her family's troubled history as well as her failing relationship with her husband.

Among the longleaf pines and family farms of eastern North Carolina, days seem to pass without incident for Margaret Clayton and Bernice Stokes until they discover each other in a friendship that will take them on the most important journey of their lives. Margaret, droll and whip smart, has a will of iron that never fails her even when her body does, while Bernice, an avid country-music fan, is rarely lucid.

Lexi, Jewel, Jermane, Capri, and Angel are women trying to hold on to their friendship, even while the messiness of life gets in the way. They share many things - complicated relationships with men, the stress of professional life, and closeness to God. Fortunately, their lively Sunday brunch sessions keep them on track through their whimsical adventures.