An introspective and beautiful dual memoir by the #1 New York Times bestselling novelist and her daughter. Look out for Ann Kidd Taylor’s new novel, The Shark Club, which will be published in June 2017. Sue Monk Kidd has touched millions of readers with her novels The Secret Life of Bees and The Mermaid Chair and with her acclaimed nonfiction. In this intimate dual memoir, she and her daughter, … intimate dual memoir, she and her daughter, Ann, offer distinct perspectives as a fifty-something and a twenty-something, each on a quest to redefine herself and to rediscover each other.
Between 1998 and 2000, Sue and Ann travel throughout Greece and France. Sue, coming to grips with aging, caught in a creative vacuum, longing to reconnect with her grown daughter, struggles to enlarge a vision of swarming bees into a novel. Ann, just graduated from college, heartbroken and benumbed by the classic question about what to do with her life, grapples with a painful depression. As this modern-day Demeter and Persephone chronicle the richly symbolic and personal meaning of an array of inspiring figures and sites, they also each give voice to that most protean of connections: the bond of mother and daughter.
A wise and involving book about feminine thresholds, spiritual growth, and renewal, Traveling with Pomegranates is both a revealing self-portrait by a beloved author and her daughter, a writer in the making, and a momentous story that will resonate with women everywhere.
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As the author moves past fifty and her daughter moves toward becoming an independent woman, the book explores their changing relationship with each other and within their own selves. Since it takes place mostly as they travel together, various places of interest and the meaning to both mother and daughter are also described. It was a little slow to me in the beginning, but once I got into the different chapters being written from the perspective of the mother, then the daughter, it added another dimension. An enjoyable read!
Good read. Thought provoking. Nice sharing of actual travels and mental journeys. “Coming of age” tales for many ages throughout life span.
I am 57 and my daughter 24 as she finishes her Masters degree this month, and I feel us right where Sue and Ann are, undergoing separate initiations together. Their writings gave me hope and inspiration for the deep connection I desire with myself and my daughter as we are traversing the deep chasms of transition into new life stages. Seen through the lens of Sue and Ann’s experiences, I love how these transitions evoke and affirm our essential and eternal wholeness, individually and collectively.
Loved the combination travelogue and inner and relationship journeys. A beautiful book with much food for thought.
Written by the author of ‘Secret Life of Bees’, I really enjoyed this book by Sue Monk Kidd and her daughter. I enjoyed reading about their relationship set in Greece and France.
Interesting memoir by mother and daughter about how each came to understand herself and how their relationship grew as two adults. However, for me it had too much symbolism (especially Marian symbolism) for it to resonate. Some will undoubtedly like it for that.
I enjoyed learning about Greece and I always enjoy her books.