DAVID DUKES was born and raised in Madison, Florida. At the age of seventeen, in 1963, he led the civil rights movement in Madison. He did voter-registration work, sit-ins at restaurants, and recreational facilities, conducted training seminars, and demonstrated in support for freedom, equality, justice, and human rights for blacks in the American South.

Described by African scholar and literary critic Chielozona Eze as “one of the most prolific African poets of the twenty-first century,” Patricia Jabbeh Wesley composed When the Wanderers Come Home during a four-month visit to her homeland of Liberia in 2013. She gives powerful voice to the pain and inner turmoil of a homeland still reconciling itself in the aftermath of multiple wars and destruction. Wesley, a native Liberian, calls on deeply rooted African motifs and proverbs, utilizing the poetics of both the West and Africa to convey her grief. Autobiographical in nature, the poems highlight the hardships of a diaspora African and the devastation of a country and continent struggling to recover. When the Wanderers Come Home is a woman’s story about being an exile, a survivor, and an outsider in her own country; it is her cry for the Africa that is being lost in wars across the continent, creating more wanderers and world citizens.

After years of caring for her family, author Laura Ruth Ellis finally felt free to pursue a new life purpose. Almost immediately, however, she was pulled back into the role of dutiful daughter when her mother succumbed to dementia. The years she spent as full-time caregiver were stressful and exhausting—but from the fears and challenges came the transformation she had sought all along. In We You Me, Laura recalls from her journal entries the emotional turmoil the caregiver role brought to her and the lessons it taught her. With intimacy and honesty, she recounts the stresses, strains, and shame she endured along the way. As the years went on, a change began; she moved from denying life’s circumstances to accepting life as it comes, eventually gaining an awareness of life’s bigger picture in the process. Her focus shifted from duty to others with love to love of duty to her inner self. Life presented the role she needed to finally find and accept who she most wanted to be and her buried dream was released. This personal narrative presents a journey of acceptance through the realms of caregiving toward true self-knowledge, as one woman’s dream deferred for duty is brought to life.

This story begins with the exciting and unpredictable journey of a young man as he comes of age as a traveling musician and poet. His journey takes him across the country through various subcultures and the musical underworld. He experiences the thrill of adventure and discovery but also succumbs to substance abuse and addiction, emotional and relational issues, brushes with the law, and eventually, a near suicide. Through spiritual healing and a long and hard look at the truth about himself and his purpose, he learns to live and love again. He comes to understand that life is about using the experiences God had brought him through—the hard times and the good, the graceful ones and the talents, and the knowledge He has provided—to live a life with true purpose, meaning, and peace.