Kin: Oprah's Book Club: A Novel

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A NEW YORK TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR SO FAR OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK •
A magnificent new novel from the bestselling, award-winning author of An American Marriage—Tayari Jones has written an unforgettable novel that sparkles with wit and intelligence and deep feeling about two lifelong friends whose worlds converge after many years apart in the face of a devastating tragedy.
A NEW YORK TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR SO FAR
“Tayari Jones’s storytelling washed over me like a trip back home. . . . Kin is a masterpiece of a novel that will live with you long after you turn the last page.” —Oprah Winfrey
Vernice and Annie, two motherless daughters raised in Honeysuckle, Louisiana, have been best friends and neighbors since earliest childhood but are fated to live starkly different lives. Raised by a fierce aunt determined to give her a stable home in the wake of her mother’s death, Vernice leaves Honeysuckle at eighteen for Spelman College, where she joins a sisterhood of powerfully connected Black women and discovers a world of affluence, manners, aspiration, and inequality. Annie, abandoned by her mother as a child and fixated on the idea of finding her and filling the bottomless hole left by her absence, sets off on a journey that will take her into a world of peril and adversity, as well as love and adventure, culminating in a battle for her life.
A novel about mothers and daughters, friendship and sisterhood, and the complexities of being a woman in the American South, Kin is an exuberant, emotionally rich, unforgettable work from one of the brightest and most irresistible voices in contemporary fiction.
A magnificent new novel from the bestselling, award-winning author of An American Marriage—Tayari Jones has written an unforgettable novel that sparkles with wit and intelligence and deep feeling about two lifelong friends whose worlds converge after many years apart in the face of a devastating tragedy.
A NEW YORK TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR SO FAR
“Tayari Jones’s storytelling washed over me like a trip back home. . . . Kin is a masterpiece of a novel that will live with you long after you turn the last page.” —Oprah Winfrey
Vernice and Annie, two motherless daughters raised in Honeysuckle, Louisiana, have been best friends and neighbors since earliest childhood but are fated to live starkly different lives. Raised by a fierce aunt determined to give her a stable home in the wake of her mother’s death, Vernice leaves Honeysuckle at eighteen for Spelman College, where she joins a sisterhood of powerfully connected Black women and discovers a world of affluence, manners, aspiration, and inequality. Annie, abandoned by her mother as a child and fixated on the idea of finding her and filling the bottomless hole left by her absence, sets off on a journey that will take her into a world of peril and adversity, as well as love and adventure, culminating in a battle for her life.
A novel about mothers and daughters, friendship and sisterhood, and the complexities of being a woman in the American South, Kin is an exuberant, emotionally rich, unforgettable work from one of the brightest and most irresistible voices in contemporary fiction.
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Community Reviews
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Readers say *Kin* by Tayari Jones beautifully explores complex themes of motherhood, kinship, and chosen family through the intertwined lives of two w...
Tayari has written a non-traditional love story or maybe even a series of love stories beautifully woven together through the lives of two characters of precarious beginnings. There are so many quotes but the truest of them all might be "Atlanta is a black soap opera".
For me, this was a slow read. It captured how the lives of two cradle friends took on two different paths, although they were both searching for the same thing... the love of a mother.
My first book by this author and I look forward to reading more by her. I especially enjoyed the character development. IMO, most could spin off for their own book and the book could be a mini-series. I also enjoyed the history that was weaved into the storyline of the life and times of the two protagonists Annie and Vernice. Great writing. Sometimes it was hard to keep track of the characters but I just wrote them down on paper with a brief description and that problem was solved. I definitely recommend it and my discussion group really enjoyed it. I rated it 8 but some rated it 10 and 9.
OMG. This book is so amazing. It's Toni Morrison meets Alice Walker meets William Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor. It's southern through and through, exploring the quicksand of slavery, its crushing aftermath, societal norms, racism, family, tradition, friendship. My god! It's fantastic. The writing is extraordinary. Jones's use of metaphor and simile is profound.
Good book that makes you think about subjects that are relevant in today's world.
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