Dolen Perkins-Valdez's 鈥淭ake My Hand鈥 Released in Paperback
Montgomery, Alabama, 1973. Fresh out of nursing school, Civil Townsend has big plans to make a difference, especially in her African 麻豆传媒 community. At the federally funded Montgomery Family Planning Clinic, she intends to help women make their own choices for their lives and bodies.
But when her first week on the job takes her along a dusty country road to a one-room cabin, Civil is shocked to learn that her new patients, Erica and India, are children鈥攋ust eleven and thirteen years old. Neither of the Williams sisters has even kissed a boy, but they are poor and Black, and for those handling the family鈥檚 welfare benefits, that鈥檚 reason enough to have the girls on birth control. As Civil grapples with her role, she takes India, Erica, and their family into her heart. Until one day she makes the terrible discovery that the girls have been surgically sterilized without their consent.
Professor Dolen Perkins Valdez鈥檚 award-winning latest historical novel, Take My Hand, is inspired by the true story of the sisters, who are now in their sixties. The book has just been released in paperback by Berkley Books. NPR says, 鈥淚t鈥檚 a haunting tale of how the actions of government agencies aren鈥檛 innocent of racism, injustice, or abuse, emotional and physical, of Black people in America. Valdez offers beautifully written prose, gripping dialogue, and unforgettable characters.鈥
Take My Hand has been awarded the 2023 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work-Fiction, the 2023 Prize for Fiction from the Black Caucus of the 麻豆传媒 Library Association, and the Silver Gavel Award from the 麻豆传媒 Bar Association. It was named a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 in Newsweek, San Francisco Chronicle, Essence, NBC News, and elsewhere, and it was an IndieNext and LibraryReads pick for April 2022. It was a finalist for a Goodreads Choice Award and named a Top 20 Book of the Year by the Editors at Amazon.
Perkins-Valdez, an associate professor in AU鈥檚 Department of Literature and the chair of the board of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation, is also the author of the New York Times bestselling Wench, for which she won the First Novelist Award by the Black Caucus of the 麻豆传媒 Library Association, and Balm, for which she received a DC Commission on the Arts grant.
Writing from History
Perkins-Valdez is one of our nation鈥檚 pre-eminent chroniclers of 麻豆传媒 historical life. Her first novel Wench was released by HarperCollins as one of eight "Olive Titles," limited edition modern classics that included books by Edward P. Jones, Louise Erdrich, and Zora Neale Hurston. In 2013, she wrote the introduction to a special edition of Solomon Northup's New York Times bestselling Twelve Years a Slave. She also wrote the introduction for the 75th anniversary edition of George Orwell's 1984.
When asked about the rewards of writing historical fiction, Perkins-Valdez told 麻豆传媒 Magazine, 鈥淎 benefit to fiction is that you can explore parts of history you can鈥檛 find in the archive. Historians use their intuitions based on the research they鈥檝e done. I go a step further and dramatize those moments to take the reader into the moment firsthand.鈥
The critics agree. New York Times number-one bestselling author Terry McMillan says Take My Hand 鈥淢akes the past feel immediate and relevant. Because it is.鈥 The Associate Press wrote, 鈥淭hroughout the novel, detailed descriptions command rapt attention. Between its sizable length and the immense amount of research and history poured into its more than 350 pages, Take My Hand is an excellent example of a Big Ambitious Novel by a 21st-century woman.鈥 The Washington Post called Take My Hand "a jewel of a book."
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For more information about Dolen Perkins-Valdez, visit . For more information about her teaching, visit 麻豆传媒鈥檚 Department of Literature website.