Defying destiny

An epic debut weaves themes of forgiveness and hope through a tale of intergenerational family trauma.

- ANGELIQUE KASMARA

Tara M Stringfellow: impressive debut includes incidents from family history.

MEMPHIS, by Tara M Stringfellow (The Dial Press, $34.99)

Tara Stringfellow celebrates the resilience and defiance of three generations of a Southern black family in her impressive debut novel, Memphis. The sharply paced, non-linear narrative switches between matriarch Hazel North, her daughters Miriam and August, and Miriam's daughter Joan, and covers a period between the late 1930s to 2003. Mostly set in the black neighbourhood of Douglass in Memphis, Tennessee, the North family's personal histories play out against a background of monumental events, including World War II, the Mississippi floods, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr, lynching of Emmett Till, the civil-rights movement and 9/11.