Reading: Urban Fiction

Ghetto born, Winter is the wealthy daughter of a prominent Brooklyn drug dealing family. Quick-witted, sexy and business-minded, Winter will do anything to stay on top. Fiction. 355 pages. Available as ebook

Goines, a career criminal and addict who took up writing during one of his seven prison sentences, has never been more hard-boiled that he is in this almost Shakespearean revenge fantasy about a hit man whose icy heart melts when his beloved daughter is lured astray by a smooth-talking pimp. Fiction. 233 pages.

After a street fights ends with a jail sentence, Yvette is forced to live far from anything and anyone she's ever known, but starting her life over again may show her what it means to have a real family. Young Adult Fiction. 256 pages.

From # 1 Essence best-selling Crime Novelist K'Wan comes a tale of forbidden love, high stakes murder and the robbery gone bad that set it all in motion. Fiction. 406 pages.

Honey’s job as an ATF agent falls apart after blowing the whistle on the wrong people, then she catches her husband with another woman and flips out. She’s now a blackjack dealer in Vegas about to pull off the crime of the century! Fiction. 223 pages.

Donald Goines' novels nail the harsh realities of the urban experience deep into the psyche of today’s hip hop culture, influencing major artists from Jay-Z and 50 Cent to Nas and Ghostface Killah. Dopefiend relates the descent into the junkie’s harrowing nightmare. Fiction. 319 pages.

James Bernard Jr., a.k.a. Dutch, has become the most dangerous criminal in New Jersey, with both the protection and respect of the Mafia. District Attorney Anthony Jacobs is determined to take Dutch and his crew down. An urban lit classic. Fiction. 242 pages.

A professional job turns personal for jet-setting contract killer Gideon in this sexy, thrilling page-turner by New York Times bestselling author Eric Jerome Dickey. Fiction. 384 pages.

There are three rules in the neighborhood: Don't cry; Don't snitch; Get revenge. Will takes his dead brother Shawn's gun, and gets in the elevator on the 7th floor. As the elevator stops on each floor, someone connected to Shawn gets on. Someone already dead. Dead by teenage gun violence. And each has something to share with Will. Young adult fiction. 306 pages.

Sixteen-year-old Bri hopes to become a great rapper, and after her first song goes viral for all the wrong reasons, must decide whether to sell out or face eviction with her widowed mother. By the author of The Hate U Give. Young adult fiction. 447 pages.

After being released from prison, Korey's intention to go straight is challenged by childhood friend and fellow ex-con Hammer, who reminds Korey of the street oath they took as kids. Fiction. 265 pages.

Tough guy Alex is primarily known by his classmates as a dangerous member of the Latino Bloods gang. He's not exactly thrilled when Brittany Ellis, the school's seemingly perfect beauty queen, is assigned as his lab partner and the feeling is more than mutual. Sparks fly in this smoldering romance. Fiction. 360 pages. Available as ebook

Yvonna's high school sweetheart is brutally murdered by her father...and behind Yvonna's back, people are keeping a secret involving her best friend. Angry, Yvonna flees to Baltimore, but returns to D.C. four years later to exact revenge. Fiction. 201 pages.

Told in reverse, this modern day Bonnie and Clyde hood story features a couple who love each other, but wreak havoc on the world surrounding them. Fiction. 196 pages.

Set in the late 1980s, this novel tells the story of Gena, a young girl from the projects, and Quadir, a millionaire drug dealer, who fall madly in love. Both of them find themselves caught up in a vicious yet seductive world, and learn that success in this game is no easy win. And, once you're in -- there's no way. Fiction. 257 pages.

When Miguel breaks out of Juvi with Rondell and Mong, his journey from the streets of Stockton to the beaches of Venice all the way down to the Mexican border shows him that life doesn’t always work out how you think it will. Fiction. 357 pages.

Alec Avery is a teacher, a respectable Black man giving back to his community with his drug dealing days long behind him. But then Breanne Phillips, formerly one of his faithful customers, shows up dragging a 16-year old hoodlum, who she says is his son. Fiction. 326 pages.