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Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
Sue Monk Kidd's debut novel, The Secret Life of Bees, spent more than one hundred weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, has sold more than six million copies in the United States, was turned into both an award winning major motion picture and a musical, and has been translated into thirty six languages. Her second novel, The Mermaid Chair, was a number one New York Times bestseller and was adapted into a television movie. Her third novel, The Invention of Wings, an Oprah's Book Club 2.0 pick, was also a number one New York Times bestseller. Her latest novel, The Book of Longings, was both a New York Times bestseller and a number one IndieBound bestseller. She is the author of several acclaimed memoirs, including The Dance of the Dissident Daughter, her groundbreaking work on religion and feminism, as well as the New York Times bestseller Traveling with Pomegranates, written with her daughter, Ann Kidd Taylor. She lives in North Carolina.
Sue Monk Kidd's website
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The Book of Longings
In The Book of Longings you take an audacious approach to history in giving voice to Ana, the wife of Jesus. What inspired you?
The idea to write a novel about the fictional wife of Jesus struck me one October morning in 2014. I was sitting at my desk, reading an article in National Geographic about a fragment of an ancient manuscript that had been brought to the world's attention by a Harvard professor. Named the "Gospel of Jesus' Wife," the manuscript contains a provocative reference in which Jesus speaks of "my wife." The fragment is now judged by most scholars to be a masterful forgery, but that would be irrelevant to the creative storm the article set off in me. My imagination was instantly ignited. Within minutes, this unknown wife had a name—Ana. I could almost picture her.
It wasn't the first time I'd been compelled by this idea—fifteen years earlier, I'd thought of writing a novel about the wife of Jesus. At the time, I'd been exploring feminist theology for years and writing about silenced and marginalized women and the missing feminine within religion. I can only speculate that the premise for the novel bloomed out of that exploration. The idea fascinated me, but it didn't seem like ...
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie grew up in Nigeria. Her work has been translated into more than fifty-five languages. She is the author of the novels Purple Hibiscus, which won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize; Half of a Yellow Sun, ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
The Invention of Wings
Try:
Americanah
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
The daughter of Pakistani immigrants, Jamila Ahmed is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Barnard College, where she studied medieval Islamic history. Her writing has been published in the Normal School, Slate, Pittsburgh-... (more)
If you enjoyed:
The Book of Longings
Try:
Every Rising Sun
by Jamila Ahmed
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