In one of the greatest American classics, Baldwin chronicles a fourteen-year-old boy's discovery of the terms of his identity. Baldwin's rendering of his protagonist's spiritual, sexual, and moral struggle of self-invention opened new possibilities in the American language and in the way Americans understand themselves. With lyrical precision, psychological directness, resonating symbolic power, and a rage that is at once unrelenting and compassionate, Baldwin tells the story of the stepson of the minister of a storefront Pentecostal church in Harlem one Saturday in March of 1935. Originally published in 1953, Baldwin said of his first novel, "Mountain is the book I had to write if I was ever going to write anything else." “With vivid imagery, with lavish attention to details ... [a] feverish story.” —The New York Times

Go Tell It on the Mountain (fiction): James Baldwin's portrayal of black people in Harlem caught up in a dramatic struggle, and of a society confronting inevitable change. The Fire Next Time (non-fiction): The powerful evocation of a childhood in Harlem that helped to galvanize the early days of the civil rights movement examines the deep consequences of racial injustice to both the individual and the body politic. If Beale Street Could Talk (fiction): A love story about two badly frightended but intensely brave, black young people.

Author and former literary agent Nathan Bransford shares his secrets for creating killer plots, fleshing out your first ideas, crafting compelling characters, and staying sane in the process. Read the guide that New York Times bestselling author Ransom Riggs called "The best how-to-write-a-novel book I've read."

A collection of critical essays on James Baldwin's Go Tell It on the Mountain.

A New York Times bestseller The author of the beloved #1 New York Times bestseller Reading Lolita in Tehran returns with the next chapter of her life in books—a passionate and deeply moving hymn to America Ten years ago, Azar Nafisi electrified readers with her multimillion-copy bestseller Reading Lolita in Tehran, which told the story of how, against the backdrop of morality squads and executions, she taught The Great Gatsby and other classics of English and American literature to her eager students in Iran. In this electrifying follow-up, she argues that fiction is just as threatened—and just as invaluable—in America today. Blending memoir and polemic with close readings of her favorite novels, she describes the unexpected journey that led her to become an American citizen after first dreaming of America as a young girl in Tehran and coming to know the country through its fiction. She urges us to rediscover the America of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and challenges us to be truer to the words and spirit of the Founding Fathers, who understood that their democratic experiment would never thrive or survive unless they could foster a democratic imagination. Nafisi invites committed readers everywhere to join her as citizens of what she calls the Republic of Imagination, a country with no borders and few restrictions, where the only passport to entry is a free mind and a willingness to dream.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • In his final years, Baldwin envisioned a book about his three assassinated friends, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King. His deeply personal notes for the project had never been published before acclaimed filmmaker Raoul Peck mined Baldwin’s oeuvre to compose his stunning documentary film I Am Not Your Negro. Peck weaves these texts together, brilliantly imagining the book that Baldwin never wrote with selected published and unpublished passages, essays, letters, notes, and interviews that are every bit as incisive and pertinent now as they have ever been. Peck’s film uses them to jump through time, juxtaposing Baldwin’s private words with his public statements, in a blazing examination of the tragic history of race in America. This edition contains more than 40 black-and-white images from the film, which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary.

The birth of Jesus is a scene of awe-inspiring humility: God in human form, born in a lowly manger for our salvation. Pepper Choplin's distinctive, folk-infused musical style is particularly well-suited to capture this story. Employing a highly-inventive mixture of mountain melodies, folk hymns, spirituals, familiar carols, and original music that is sure to surprise and delight, Go Sing It on the Mountain proclaims the good news from the prophet Isaiah's proclamation, "Comfort, O comfort my people, to the final exuberant celebration: Joy to the World! Christ is born!" Solos, Duets, and Trios shine the spotlight on featured singers and nicely complement the SATB choruses.