If we ruled the world ...

The Angry Black Woman's Guide to Life

by Denene Millner, Angela Burt-Murray and Mitzi Miller Plume, April 2004 $12.00. ISBN 0-452-28512-7

The more I read, the more I realized that I am an ABW (Angry Black Woman) and product of it! The title is a little mis-leading but The Strong Black Woman's Guide to Life or The Irrepressible Black Woman's Guide to Life isn't nearly as catchy. The authors have written a fun book filled with facts about the strong, proud, confident black women who have shaped our history and have helped to mold many of us. Harriet Tubman. Rosa Parks. Anita Hill, Aretha Franklin, Serena Williams. Mary J. Blige, Clare Huxtable and even Condoleezza Rice are dubbed ABWs.

The book takes a humorous look at many of the situations ABWs find themselves in daily: at work--a white coworker asking "Can I touch your hair?"; at home--your daughter rolling her eyes when asked, for the umpteenth time, to clean her room: and in relationships: your man lying about an affair claiming, "It wasn't me."

The authors' quick-witted responses to these dilemmas are served up with the aplomb of Florence from The Jeffersons and the acerbic calm Erykah Badu invoked when she told her man to "... call Tyrone."

The book culminates with a list of the 100 Things Thai Make an ABW Happy. The secret is out: it's the little things, like the joy derived from reading this book.

Swerve: Reckless Observations of a Postmodern Girl

by Aisha Tyler Dutton, January 2004 $21.95 ISBN 0-525-94806-6

Is love a battlefield? Does size (yours) matter? The art of bed hopping: Are you game? Aisha Tyler answers these questions and many more in Swerve. Former E! Entertainment Talk Soup cohost, stand-up comedienne, actress and NBC's Friends guest star, Tyler brings her comedic flare to a debut work of nonfiction composed of essays that reflect on some of the postmodern girl's most pressing issues. Tyler invites her readers to swerve from the tried and true by veering into their destinies and becoming leaders in their destinies one-woman parades. I can't think of a better way to start off the spring.

Kalyn Johnson is a lawyer practicing in New York and a coauthor of The BAP Handbook.