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Also by Sue Monk Kidd:

The Book of Longings, April 2021
Trade Size / e-Book
The Book of Longings, May 2020
Hardcover / e-Book
The Invention Of Wings, January 2014
Hardcover / e-Book
Traveling with Pomegranates, September 2009
Paperback
The Secret Life of Bees, August 2008
Paperback
The Dance of the Dissident Daughter, January 2007
Hardcover
When the Heart Waits, November 2006
Paperback
Firstlight, October 2006
Hardcover
The Mermaid Chair, April 2005
Hardcover
The Secret Life of Bees, January 2003
Trade Size (reprint)
God's Joyful Surprise, March 1989
Paperback

THE INVENTION OF WINGS
By: Sue Monk Kidd

Viking
January 2014
On Sale: January 7, 2014
Featuring: Sarah Grimke; Hetty "Handful" Grimke
384 pages
ISBN: 0670024783
EAN: 9780670024780
Kindle: B00H58VGIA
Hardcover / e-Book
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Fiction

Writing at the height of her narrative and imaginative gifts, Sue Monk Kidd presents a masterpiece of hope, daring, the quest for freedom, and the desire to have a voice in the world—and it is now the newest Oprah’s Book Club 2.0 selection.

Hetty “Handful” Grimke, an urban slave in early nineteenth century Charleston, yearns for life beyond the suffocating walls that enclose her within the wealthy Grimke household. The Grimke’s daughter, Sarah, has known from an early age she is meant to do something large in the world, but she is hemmed in by the limits imposed on women.

Kidd’s sweeping novel is set in motion on Sarah’s eleventh birthday, when she is given ownership of ten year old Handful, who is to be her handmaid. We follow their remarkable journeys over the next thirty five years, as both strive for a life of their own, dramatically shaping each other’s destinies and forming a complex relationship marked by guilt, defiance, estrangement and the uneasy ways of love.

As the stories build to a riveting climax, Handful will endure loss and sorrow, finding courage and a sense of self in the process. Sarah will experience crushed hopes, betrayal, unrequited love, and ostracism before leaving Charleston to find her place alongside her fearless younger sister, Angelina, as one of the early pioneers in the abolition and women’s rights movements.

Inspired by the historical figure of Sarah Grimke, Kidd goes beyond the record to flesh out the rich interior lives of all of her characters, both real and invented, including Handful’s cunning mother, Charlotte, who courts danger in her search for something better.

This exquisitely written novel is a triumph of storytelling that looks with unswerving eyes at a devastating wound in American history, through women whose struggles for liberation, empowerment, and expression will leave no reader unmoved.

Media Buzz

All Things Considered - January 8, 2014