September 2019 Meeting

​This month’s novel, An American Marriage by Tayari Jones, explores the marriage of a middle-class African-American couple and the aftermath of their lives as they are torn apart by wrongful conviction and imprisonment. An American Marriage was a 2018 Best of the Year selection of NPR, Time, and Bustle, a New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book, and a 2018 Oprah Book Club book. It won the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work, Fiction and the 2019 Women’s Prize for Fiction. Tayari Jones, a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, has been the recipient of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, Lifetime Achievement Award in Fine Arts from the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, United States Artist Fellowship, NEA Fellowship and Radcliffe Institute Bunting Fellowship. Her writing has appeared in Tin House, The Believer, The New York Times, and Callaloo. 

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to twelve years for a crime Celestial knows he didn’t commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison passes, she is unable to hold on to the love that has been her center. After five years, Roy’s conviction is suddenly overturned, and he returns to Atlanta ready to resume their life together.
 
This stirring love story is a profoundly insightful look into the hearts and minds of three people who are at once bound and separated by forces beyond their control. An American Marriage is a masterpiece of storytelling, an intimate look deep into the souls of people who must reckon with the past while moving forward—with hope and pain—into the future.

via GIPHY

If this sounds like something you'd like to read, you can get your copy of the book from the store with a 15% discount until the end of September. You can also get the audiobook from our partner, Libro.fm! Click here to get yours!

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Relevant Reviews & Interviews

"An American Marriage: Redefining the American Love Story" -- NPR
"You Have To Work With the Love You Are Given" -- Tin House
"The Epistolary Heat of An American Marriage" -- The Atlantic
"If I Can't Cry, Nobody Cries: An Interview with Tayari Jones" -- The Paris Review

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We'll meet at Foggy Pine Books on September 28th at 7:30pm. There will be free wine and snacks for book club members to share.  Bring a friend and come discuss the book with us, even if you weren't able to completely finish it or if you didn't like it. You can see the Facebook event & RSVP here.