Showing results by narrator "Mirron Willis" in All Categories

Stephen Curry’s journey to the NBA wasn’t easy. Coaches and recruiters repeatedly told him he was too small to make it in the big leagues. But Stephen used their doubts to shape his ever-positive attitude and fuel his own underdog success story. Now, Curry pens an original story to inspire the next generation of go-getters and big dreamers.

Michael Hyter is one of the nation's highest regarded executives of color and a widely respected thought leader in the area of talent development and leadership succession. To get there, he worked hard and made his work count through efficacy. In The Power of Choice he reveals the lessons he learned along the way - putting you on the fast track to career success.

A city equal parts darkness and hope. A scarred city. An often violent one. But a resilient city, too. That's our Memphis. Like many cities we have a namesake - in Egypt, Men-nefer became Menfe became Memphis, enduring and beautiful, on the banks of the Nile. Centuries later, another continent, another people, another river: Memphis, Tennessee, the soul of the Mississippi Delta, was formed.

With Stanley Crouch's untimely death in 2020, American literature lost "a critic without peer" (Ta-Nehisi Coates). Born in Los Angeles in 1945, Crouch—a towering stylist, fearless columnist, and without question, one of the finest jazz critics of all time—was Rabelaisian both in stature and in intellectual appetite. Beloved yet cantankerous, Crouch delighted and enflamed the passions of his readers in equal measure, whether writing about race, politics, literature, or music.

The American boxing champ and vocal civil rights activist Muhammad Ali is the 27th hero in the New York Times best-selling picture book biography series for ages 5 to 8. Muhammad Ali was the leading heavyweight boxer of the 20th century and a charismatic, beloved public figure. His objection to the military draft during the Vietnam War made him an icon for a generation, and his impact in sports and the Civil Rights movement is still felt today.

Death awaits the curious! Out along the rim of the galaxy hangs a loose configuration of some 60 stars known as the Faustian Chain. This whorl of sparkling suns is rich in planets and occupies an irregular volume of space some 20 light years in diameter. From an external viewpoint, the Chain presents a colorful display of plasma-streams, luminous nebulae and sparkling pinpoints of light.

Lloyd Daniels learned to hoop on the playgrounds of Brooklyn and Queens during the 1980s. "Swee'pea" they called him. His rep on the court traveled all the way to the Bronx and across the country, earning him enthusiastic comparisons to the likes of Magic Johnson. Swee'pea was sure to make it to the big time and out of a New York City where drugs and violence had gripped many of its neighborhoods. Eventually he did, leaving the city's asphalt courts for the shiny hardwoods of NCAA programs.

The Skaintz Imperium was eradicated from the backwater planet of Garm, but at great cost. The population of the world was decimated within weeks, and Garm will never be the same. At least humanity can breathe easily knowing that the mysterious aliens are all dead.... But are they? Using their natural form of communication, Skaintz radio signals did chirrup and click, however briefly. Transmissions in their ancient language now spread at the speed of light in a growing sphere.

In a warehouse full of forgotten books, a man at the beginning of his adult life - and the end of his career rope - becomes involved with a woman, a language, and a great lie that will define his future. He runs across Itsik Malpesh, an old Russian immigrant who claims to be the last Yiddish poet in America. When a set of accounting ledgers in which Malpesh has written his memoirs surfaces, the young man is compelled to translate them, bringing together two paths that coincide in shocking and unexpected ways.

A Nigerian graduate student who has made his home in America knows what it means to strike out for new shores. When his wife proposes that he accompany her to Berlin, where she has been awarded a prestigious arts fellowship, he has his reservations. In Berlin, he is thrown into contact with a community of African immigrants and refugees whose lives previously seemed distant from his own, but to which he is increasingly drawn. The walls between his privileged, secure existence and the stories of these other Africans on the move soon crumble.

In Dig Deep, J.C. Watts offers seven powerful maxims that have kept him grounded throughout his roller-coaster career from star college quarterback to U.S. Congressman. The first black Republican ever elected to a leadership position in Congress, Watts resisted the rat-race of Washington and eventually declined re-election. His seven simple principles are a blueprint for living a fulfilling and meaningful life without falling to the temptations of reckless ambition or indulgence.

The case starts out close to home: Daniel Kirkland never arrived at Yale for the spring semester. Daniel's mother Grace, a friend of Smokey Dalton's and his son Jimmy's beloved teacher, sacrificed everything to get Daniel into one of the country’s most prestigious schools. What at first seems like a missing persons case becomes something bigger, as Smokey delves into the heart of the anti-war movement. Gradually he realizes that he has stumbled into America’s second war of the decade: the war at home.

Witness powerful stories about the effects and realities of living in a prejudiced society in this audio bundle of classic Black narratives. These selections are both fictional and nonfictional stories of living in a society that devalues and dehumanizes the lives of Black people. Though all four of these books were written more than a hundred years ago, the realities within are still important for modern audiences to understand.

Caliph Washington's life was never supposed to matter. As a Black teenager from the vice-ridden city of Bessemer, Alabama, Washington was wrongfully convicted of killing an Alabama policeman in 1957. Sentenced to death, he came within minutes of the electric chair - nearly a dozen times. A Kafka-esque legal odyssey in which Washington's original conviction was overturned three times before he was finally released in 1972, his story is the kind that pervades the history of American justice.

When former drug kingpin Keith "Big K" Turner is released from prison after serving 16 years, things aren't as they once were. Not only has the neighborhood he once reigned over changed; his entire family has changed as well. When his wife, Desiree, is found murdered, all fingers point to Big K's enemies in the streets. But that may be just the way the killer wants it to seem. When Detective Brice Simpson, the newly dubbed "hood detective" takes the case, he soon finds himself up against some of the hood's most dangerous people, some of whom he grew up with.

Joseph Laroche was an anomaly among the passengers of the Titanic. He was exceptionally well-educated in a time when few Black men had access to an education - and when even fewer were able to travel on a luxurious ship in first or second class. When his family arrived in the United States without him after the Titanic's tragic crash, they were received well along with the other survivors and even sponsored by a wealthy New York heiress. Who was Joseph Laroche? Where was he going, and what was his story? This biography recounts the life of Joseph Laroche.

Ten-year-old Tae Kwon Do blue belt and budding rock hound Brendan Buckley keeps a "Confidential" notebook for his top-secret scientific discoveries. And he's found something totally top secret. The grandpa he's never met, who his mom refuses to talk about or see, lives nearby! Secretly, Brendan visits Ed DeBose, whose skin is pink, not brown like Brendan's. Brendan sets out to find the reason behind Ed's absence, but now he wishes he'd never found him at all.

A dozen years after his last visit, Jeebleh returns to his beloved Mogadiscio to see old friends. He is accompanied by his son-in-law, Malik, a journalist intent on covering the region's ongoing turmoil. What greets them at first is not the chaos Jeebleh remembers, however, but an eerie calm enforced by ubiquitous white-robed figures bearing whips.

In Freedom Teaching, educator and distinguished anti-racism practitioner Matthew Kincaid delivers a one-stop resource for educators and educational leaders seeking to improve equity and increase the cultural responsiveness of their school. In this book, you'll discover the meaning and fundamentals of anti-racist education and find a roadmap to reducing the impact of systemic racism in your classroom.

Naomi and Ely are best friends. Naomi loves and is in love with Ely, and Ely loves Naomi, but prefers to be in love with boys. So they create their "No Kiss List" of people neither of them is allowed to kiss. And this works fine - until Bruce. Bruce is Naomi's boyfriend, so there's no reason to put him on the List. But Ely kissed Bruce even though he is boring. The result: a rift of universal proportions and the potential end of "Naomi and Ely: the institution." Can these best friends come back together again?