Showing results by publisher "Recorded Books" in Geography & Cultures

Young Tepary Jones leads a life of constant adventure. But he gets more excitement than even he can handle when he plays a flute he finds in an ancient ruin. Magic from the Distant Time changes him into a bushy-tailed woodrat and ensnares him in a world of danger and suspense. His parents don’t realize what’s happened to him - only his dog Dusty knows. With Dusty alone to protect him from nightly predators, Tepary must unravel the mystery behind the owner of the flute - Kokopelli himself.

Maleeka Madison is a dark skinned African-American girl. She feels uncomfortable and wishes she had lighter skin. When her teacher, Miss Saunders, who suffers from a rare skin condition, shows that there is more to people than the color of their skin, Maleeka learns to appreciate and accept who she truly is.

Junior, a 300 pound musical and artistic prodigy, depends on his imagination for companionship. Buddy is used to depending on no one but himself. Homeless, he uses his wits to survive the streets. With the help of Mr. Poole, the school custodian, the two boys discover a sheltered universe of their own in the basement room. When their hiding place is discovered, and Junior loses the only place he feels safe, his imagination takes over. It will take all of Buddy’s resource to protect his friend as the realities of Junior’s world come crashing in around them both.

A stray kitty gets a job in a sumo stable, chasing mice in exchange for food. But when eating like a sumo wrestler slows our feline hero down, he realizes he must train like a wrestler, too. Through hard work and perseverance - and with a little help from a big buddy - SumoKitty is born! A funny and heartwarming story inspired by the Japanese saying, "Fall down seven times, stand up eight."

Madam C. J. Walker was beloved within her community for her philanthropy and expanding the local black YMCA, but she couldn't have done that if she weren't the first female self-made millionaire and one of the most successful African American business owners ever. Born Sarah Breedlove, she was the first person born free in her family. She married Charles Joseph Walker and became known as Madam C. J. Walker, the name she would later use on her haircare products.

G-baby and her younger sister, Peaches, are still getting used to their "blended-up" family. They live with Mama and Frank out in the suburbs, and they haven't seen their real daddy much since he married Millicent. G-baby misses her best friend back in Atlanta, and is crushed that her glamorous new stepsister, Tangie, wants nothing to do with her. G-baby is so preoccupied with earning Tangie's approval that she isn't there for her own little sister when she needs her most. Peaches gets sick - really sick. Suddenly, Mama and Daddy are arguing like they did before the divorce....

It's 1965, Los Angeles. All 12-year-old Sophie wants to do is write her book, star in the community play, and hang out with her friend Jennifer. But she's the new black kid in a nearly all-white neighborhood; her beloved sister, Lily, is going away to college soon; and her parents' marriage is rocky. There's also her family's new, disapproving housekeeper to deal with. When riots erupt in nearby Watts and a friend is unfairly arrested, Sophie learns that life - and her own place in it - is even more complicated than she'd once thought.

Thirteen-year-old Nandu lives in the newly established Royal Elephant Breeding Center on the edge of the jungle. Here, the King's elephants are to be raised under the protective watch of the stable. Nandu - along with his adoptive father Subba-sahib, his mentors, friends, and the rest of the elephant drivers - is tested by man and nature as earthquakes, drought, wild herds, and rumors of poachers threaten the center.

Once upon a time there was a princess...who made a pit stop. While the birds and beasts changed her tires, her fairy godmother told her she was in last place! With just one lap left! She might as well give up! Give up? Not this princess! Instead, she hit the gas! Join Her Royal Highness in the driver's seat for a mad dash to the finish in this exciting ode to auto racing.

This rhythmic, read-aloud title is an unbridled celebration of the self-esteem, confidence, and swagger boys feel when they leave the barber's chair - a tradition that places on their heads a figurative crown, beaming with jewels, that confirms their brilliance and worth and helps them not only love and accept themselves but also take a giant step toward caring how they present themselves to the world. Crown is a high-spirited, engaging salute to the beautiful, raw, assured humanity of black boys and how they see themselves when they approve of their reflections in the mirror.

It's 1863, and dinosaurs roam the streets of New York as the Civil War rages between raptor-mounted armies down South. Magdalys Roca and her friends from the Colored Orphan Asylum are on a field trip when the Draft Riots break out, and a number of their fellow orphans are kidnapped by an evil magistrate, Richard Riker. Magdalys and her friends flee to Brooklyn and settle in the Dactyl Hill neighborhood. Together with the Vigilance Committee, they train to fly on dactylback, discover new friends and amazing dinosaurs, and plot to take down Riker.

Roberto Alvarez’s world changed the day he could no longer attend Lemon Grove Grammar School in the small, rural community where he lived near San Diego, California. He and the other Mexican American students were told they had to go to a new, separate school on Olive Street. A school just for them. A school where they would not hold back the other students. But Roberto and the Mexican American students and their families believed the new school’s real purpose was to segregate, to separate. They didn’t think that was right, or just, or legal.

Black hands in Fayette County, Tennessee, were free to pick cotton and corn but were barred from casting ballots. A whirlwind of change blew through the county when Black landowners like John McFerren and Harpman Jameson organized registration drives to help Black citizens vote—but not without violent attempts to stop it. White farmers evicted Black sharecroppers off their land, leaving families stranded and forced to live in tents. White shopkeepers also refused to sell to them. But the voiceless did finally speak. In 1965 the Voting Rights Act legally ended voter discrimination.

When North and South met in 1865 at Appomattox Court House to end the Civil War, the official terms of surrender weren’t written in the hand of Ulysses S. Grant, Robert E. Lee, or any white soldier. Instead, this momentous event was recorded by General Ely S. Parker, a member of the Seneca (Iroquois) tribe. At that time, Parker was not only the highest-ranking Native American in the Union Army but also the Grand Sachem, or chief representative, of the Haudenosaunee—the powerful Iroquois Confederacy.

Cheryl loves horses. She’s been studying thoroughbreds at her family’s horse-racing stables since she was old enough to ride on the shoulders of her father, a famous horse trainer. Cheryl wants to be a jockey. One problem—she is a girl, and there has never been a Black female jockey in history! Jetolara is a young thoroughbred finding his place in the herd.

Famous founding father Benjamin Franklin was a proud subject of the British Empire—until he wasn’t. It took nearly seventy years and seven not-so-easy steps to turn Benjamin Franklin from a loyal British subject to a British traitor—and a fired-up American revolutionary. In this light, whimsical narrative, young listeners learn how Franklin came to be a rebel, beginning with his childhood lesson in street smarts when he buys a whistle at an inflated price

You are INVITED. To a most marvelous party. For a most marvelous man. A man who turned the alphabet into THUMP A BUMP. Who turned words into JAZZ into RIVERS into BUSTIN' A MOVE. All of his word-children will be there, uh-huh. Because it’s a party for LANGSTON. Langston Hughes. King o’ Letters. Renaissance Man. So don’t be shy. Come on in. To the Hoopla in Harlem. EVERYONE is welcome.

Antares de la Vega is an adventurer at heart. He dreams of journeying across burning deserts, trekking through wild and uncharted jungles, sailing the farthest reaches of the seas—and yet, he’s never stepped foot outside of South Florida. Until strange creatures come leaping out of lightning bolts to kidnap him. Locked away in a secret prison in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle, Antares meets Magdavellía, a mysterious and iron-willed girl who opens his eyes to a shocking truth: This world is a far different—and weirder—place than he’s been led to believe.

Equal parts heartwarming and heartbreaking, Wrong Way Summer is a road-trip journey and coming-of-age story about one girl’s struggle to understand when a lie is really a lie, and when it’s something more: hope....

What is it like to walk away from your home? To leave behind everything and everyone you’ve ever known? Poetic, sensitive, and based on a true family history, Lost Words follows a young Armenian boy who sets out to find refuge to the day he finally finds the courage to share his story.