Black Star
Age 12+
Historical Fiction
In the second epic novel of the bestselling The Door of No Return trilogy, we meet Charley, Kofi's granddaughter, who is growing up in the Jim Crow-era American South
Set during the turbulent segregation era, Kwame Alexander weaves a spellbinding story of struggle, determination and the unflappable faith of an American family.
Twelve-year old Charley is set on becoming the first female pitcher to play professional baseball, even if that’s a lofty dream for a Black girl in the American South in the 1920s. Even so, her grandfather Kofi’s thrilling stories about courageous ancestors and epic journeys make it impossible not to dream big. She knows he has so much more to tell, but according to her parents, she isn’t old enough to know about certain things, like what happened to Booker Preston that one night in Great Bridge, and why she can never play on the brand-new baseball field on the other side of town.
When Charley challenges a neighbourhood bully to a game at the church picnic, she knows she can win, even with her ragtag team. Then a dispute on the field leads to Charley making a fateful decision, one that will bring consequences she never could have imagined.
The Times’ 20 best children’s books of 2025
Creators
Kwame Alexander is a poet, educator, and the New York Times bestselling author of numerous books, including Rebound, shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal, The Crossover, winner of the Newbery Medal, and The Undefeated, winner of the Caldecott Medal. Kwame is also the recipient of several other awards, including the Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award and the Coretta Scott King Author Honour. He is the writer and executive producer of The Crossover TV series, which won a Daytime Emmy Award, and is co-founder of LEAP for Ghana, an international literacy programme.
Reviews
Supremely satisfying and zings with confidence
The Times, Children’s Book of the Week
In Black Star (the title invokes the Black visionary Marcus Garvey’s Black Star Steamship Line), Alexander deploys a daring and brilliantly successful literary technique. The novel is constructed from a series of poems—some lyrical, some dramatic, some conversational—all filtered through Charley’s sparkling twelve-year-old intelligence. Many of the poems are dialogues; one even rhymes. Altogether they create a thrilling, touching story easily accessible to readers aged 10 and up, including adults.
Historical Novel Society
This is another realistic, powerful, and quietly, painfully beautiful portrayal of Black history by Alexander. Charley is young and naive but curious and inquisitive. Her parents try to protect her from the evils of the world, while her grandfather argues that she needs to know the truth of what faces their community. And while the latter quarter of the book is sad and difficult, it ends with resilience and hope. As in Door of No Return, the narrative is told in verse – sometimes leaning more towards poetry, other times more towards a lyrical prose. But don’t let that deter you, as it still reads as a sequential, fictional story.
A New York Tate of Mind
This is Alexander’s second book in the Door of No Return trilogy, and he effectively fulfills his objective to write about America through the lens of sports while also acknowledging the humanity of “regular families.” Along the way, Alexander shares some key truths, with one of those being: “The true worth of a society is measured by the opportunities it offers its children” (191-192).
Phoenix Book Company
Luminous and compelling, there’s a powerful sense of community, family and coming together throughout the novel. Black Star is also laden with powerful — and often moving — wisdom from Nana Kofi, and pitch-perfect in evoking that liminal space between childhood and the teenage transition to adulthood.
Lovereading4kids
