There are a lot of good books out there. A Bible scripture says "to the making of books there is no end," (Ecclesiastes 12:12) some have misconstrued this to mean Stop Reading Books! I say KEEP READING as if there's no end.

If you want powerful information as to how and why our streets are so dangerous today and who are the decision makers behind these horrific events, then you came to the right place. Read On!

10)     Eighteen Brothers and Sisters: A memoir by Seeta Bequi. Seeta Bequi ISBN 9781467910415. A real-life Coming-To-America Story of a young girl from a large Indian family who rose up out of a controlling religion and spousal abuse to be a voice of empowerment for women.

9)    Redeem Yourself: To Thy Own Self Be True. Jerome Livingston Jr. ISBN 9780984945504. Livingston's 2nd book deals with the most feared word in the black community today; Change. He is an author and lecturer and being from the streets of New York he cites himself as valid proof that positive change can come.

8)    The Resurrection of Nat Turner, Part 1: The Witnesses. Sharon Ewell Foster. ISBN 9781416578031. The Mother of all Nat Turner books, expertly researched and written in the form of a two volume novel. This is the life, upbringing, planning, assembling and mass-slaughter by the black man white historians and educators still don't know how to handle. Don't always ask "What would Martin Do?" Learn when to ask 'What Would Nat Do?'

7)    The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America. Khalil Gibran Muhammad. ISBN 9780674035973. God created blacks, but who created black criminality thousands of years later? Because as Muhammad puts it, this condemnation has become "one of the most widely accepted basis for justifying prejudicial thinking, discriminatory treatment, and/or racial violence as an instrument of public safety."

6)   Spirit and Soul: Odyssey of a Black Man in America. Theodore Kirkland. ISBN 13-9781469186252. Those of us in Buffalo know this man to be one of our best story tellers, activists, talk radio hosts, and columnists. So it comes to no surprise to me that there was a book burning inside of him, waiting to be unleashed. A Korean War Veteran and Law Enforcement officer, and first black man to head the New York State Parole Board. Much of the history he writes was made or helped shape by him.

5)   Dear White America: Letter to a New Minority. Letter to a new minority. Tim Wise. ISBN 9780872865211. The latest work from the self-described anti-racism activist as well as author/lecturer/ educator. This looks as if it started out as one of Wise' many long written addresses to White America to point the finger at themselves when it comes to the race-blame, but inadvertently becomes a book. He leaves no room for those in denial, in the closet, or even openly liberal about race.

4)   Reality Bites Back: The Troubling Truth About Guilty Pleasure TV. The troubling truth about guilty pleasure TV. Jennifer L. Pozner. 9781580052658. As revealing a read about "Reality TV" and the sick minds who perpetuate it, as John Potash' book is about the FBI, and CIA's war on political musicians. Television entertainment has always played a slick role in the shaping of minds for or against anyone or anything. At a time when blacks, women, and gays have fought for more positive roles on prime-time shows, you'll learn that when those gains are won Hollywood considers that a setback. Meet the creators of the ideas that bring back the old stereotypes, at bargain basement prices; Mike Fleiss, a former sports reporter who was literally frustrated by his being restricted to the facts. Mike Darnell, whom Pozner calls the "King of bottom-feeder reality TV schlock." Michael Hirschorn who actually believes the Minstrel Show called "Flavor of Love" serves a higher purpose. Well-known Reality show personalities Donald Trump and Tyra Banks use the same racial and sexist stereotypes to weed out people on their respective shows (Donald surprises no one, but you'd be best served not to think just because Tyra is African American that she won't stoop to these levels).

The tricks used to instigate the imfamous catfights of the "Real Housewives of (pick a city)...," "Basketball Wives," "Love and Hip Hop" etc., border on enough torture to almost make Bush and Cheney envious; "Producers ensure that women dutifully perform their bitch-tastic roles by egging them on with techniques that would make psyops intelligence officers proud. Based on interviews with two dozen reality TV stars, The New York Times reported that reality television has become 'Hollywood's sweatshop,' functioning behind the scenes like a 'psychological experiment that keeps contestants off-balance and vulnerable... programs routinely use isolation, sleeplessness and alcohol to encourage wild behavior.' And so they snipe away." Since some of this is basic deprivation, what prevents them from waterboarding? Hmmm. What qualifies Pozner to write this book is one simple line on page-107 at the bottom of the 2nd paragraph: "If women are conditioned to consider other women lying backstabbers, we are less likely to organize together for better working conditions or pay equity." Bingo!

Gains made by black sitcoms that glorified black women of all tones, shapes, and sizes in shows like "A Different World," and "Living Single" saw a setback when Hollywood carted out the attitude-problem black female roles in the oddly-named "Girlfriends." Now along comes realty TV riding in to purposely smash whatever is left of women's liberation. You have NeNe Leakes of "Real Housewives of Atlanta;" a woman once seen on the show not knowing the difference between one half, and one third when her husband was trying to explain this to their kid.Houston we have a problem. Just remember one lie, all these men who bring you these shows blame You the viewer. It's not their fault.

3)   The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black Leaders: U.S. Intelligence's Murderous Targeting of Tupac, MLK, Malcolm, Panthers, Hendrix, Marley, Rappers and Linked Ethnic Leftists. John Potash. ISBN 979146909. Picture a government so afraid of blacks expressing themselves freely, that they will use the most effective and covert means to discredit them, and eventually destroy them. According to Potash that's how they harassed rapper Tupac until he was eliminated. Same story with Biggie. Twelve years of research by Potash' findings expose US intelligence networks spending an exorbitant amount of time spying on musicians from the hippy-era all the way up to the pants-saggin era to spot and track which ones have the most potential to make people think, and therefore come together and unite. Even the Twilight Zone couldn't come up with a script that good. But it's happened beneath our nose for decades now.

What many of us thought was just rap wars based on internal beefs, turns out to have originated with the real brains behind Death Row Records. Not Marion Suge Knight, just the face of Death Row, the label was saturated with LAPD and US intelligence operatives. Knight of course is never going to be anyone's CIA agent, his purpose was twofold; 1-end the truce between the Bloods, and the Crips gangs in South Central, to get the drug money and death going again. 2-Make sure these feuds appear to originate with rappers. Several attempts were made on Tupac's life. Most of which the public at large doesn't know about. It appears Tupac's public bad-boy persona was just a clever front he used to sell records, behind the scenes he lived up to his Black Panther bloodlines to organize black youths and prisoners and awaken them to their real enemy.

2)    The New Doubting Thomas. Jeremiah Camara. ISBN 9780615396378. Yet another book by JC (not that JC) on money-sucking preachers and religious hustlers from the man who brings you the stinging-but-humorous YouTube series "Slave Sermons."

1)   The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the age of colorblindness. Michelle Alexander. ISBN 9781595586438. This is the most talked about book around the country today, if you think racism is over because there is a black man in the Oval Office then you need to read this badly.

Is mass incarceration a conscious payback by America over the gains achieved by Civil Rights? Why do southern states have vagrancy laws and how are these laws always seemingly pointed in the direction of blacks? What part did the Reagan Administration play in the explosion of illegal drugs? These and other hard questions are addressed by Alexander.

BlackCommentator.com Columnist, Chris Stevenson, is a syndicated columnist, his articles also appear on his blog; the Buffalo Bullet. Follow him on Twitter @pointblank009) and Facebook (pointblank009). Support his petition to permanently Abolish the Death Penalty in the US the Troy Davis Bill, HR92111. Click here to contact Mr. Stevenson.