The Darkest Child
Delores Phillips
ISBN: 9781569473788
Published: November, 2017
Pricing
Paperback $15.95
Description
A new edition of this award-winning modern classic, with a new introduction by Tayari Jones, an excerpt from the never before seen follow-up novel, and discussion guide.
Pakersfield, Georgia, 1958: Thirteen-year-old Tangy Mae Quinn is the sixth of ten fatherless siblings. She is the darkest-skinned among them and there...
A new edition of this award-winning modern classic, with a new introduction by Tayari Jones, an excerpt from the never before seen follow-up novel, and discussion guide.
Pakersfield, Georgia, 1958: Thirteen-year-old Tangy Mae Quinn is the sixth of ten fatherless siblings. She is the darkest-skinned among them and therefore the ugliest in her mother, Rozelle’s, estimation, but she’s also the brightest. Rozelle—beautiful, charismatic, and light-skinned—exercises a violent hold over her children. Fearing abandonment, she pulls them from school at the age of twelve and sends them to earn their keep for the household, whether in domestic service, in the fields, or at “the farmhouse” on the edge of town, where Rozelle beds local men for money.
But Tangy Mae has been selected to be part of the first integrated class at a nearby white high school. She has a chance to change her life, but can she break from Rozelle’s grasp without ruinous—even fatal—consequences?
Media
“Filled with grand plot events and clearly identifiable villains and victims . . . lush with detail and captivating with its story of racial tension and family violence.”
—The Washington Post Book World
“The Darkest Child is an exceptional debut from a most talented writer. Epic in scope, intimate in tone, it is sure to find a special place in the deepest crevices of your heart. ”
—Edwidge Danticat
“A fierce and bitter story, told with striking authority. Delores Phillips has created a family and a town rich with resonant voices, all of them caught up in struggles both personal and public, and a mother so wildly commanding she earns a place beside some of the great mad women who embitter the lives of the children who love them.”
—Rosellen Brown, author of Half a Heart and Civil Wars
“[A] searing debut . . . Using a cast of powerfully drawn characters, Phillips captures life in a town that serves as a microcosm of a world on the brink of change.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A grim tale, set in the dying days of segregation, about one young woman’s struggle to escape her past, her mother, and her duties . . . Phillips writes vividly.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A brilliant, unnerving, memorable debut.”