Sue Monk Kidd & Ann Kidd Taylor
SUE MONK KIDD was raised in the small town of Sylvester, Georgia. She graduated from Texas Christian University in 1970 and later took creative writing courses at Emory University, as well as studying at Sewanee, Bread Loaf, and other writers’ conferences. In her forties, Kidd turned her attention to writing fiction, winning the South Carolina Fellowship in Literature and the 1996 Poets & Writers Exchange Program in Fiction.
When her first novel, The Secret Life of Bees, was published by Viking in 2002, it became a genuine literary phenomenon, spending more than 2½ years on the New York Times bestseller list. It has been translated into 36 languages and sold more than 6 million copies in the U.S. and 8 million copies worldwide. Bees was named the Book Sense Paperback Book of the Year in 2004, long-listed for the 2002 Orange Prize in England, and won numerous awards. The novel was adapted into a award-winning movie and an Off-Broadway musical.
The Mermaid Chair spent 24 weeks on the New York Times hardcover bestseller list, reaching the #1 position, and spent 22 weeks on the New York Times trade paperback list. The novel won the Nation Quill Award and was made into the television movie.
The Invention of Wings, her third novel, was published in 2014 to wide critical acclaim and debuted at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list where it remained for 9 months. It was selected for Oprah Winfrey's Bookclub 2.0 and other awards. Wings has been translated to 20+ languages.
She is also the author of several acclaimed memoirs, including The Dance of the Dissident Daughter and New York Times bestseller Traveling with Pomegranates, written with her daughter, Ann Kidd Taylor.
Her latest novel, The Book of Longings, is to be published on April 21, 2020.
Kidd lives in North Carolina with her husband.
Please visit www.suemonkkidd.com for more information. Follow Sue on Twitter & Instagram @SueMonkKidd and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/suemonkkidd
“I realize what a strange in-between place I am in. The Young Woman inside has turned to go, but the Old Woman has not shown up.”
“Yet I remember the rule I set for myself-that I do something different from my mother. . . I started to believe I couldn't really do that if I was following in the path of either of my parents... That so-called rule helped me separate more fully from my mother and father, I realize, but maybe it also kept me from seeing what was right in front of me. ”
“We write to taste life twice," Anais Nin wrote, "in the moment and in retrospection.”
“Into every life a little rain must fall.”
“Ms. came into practice, to give a woman an alternative to being recognized by her marital status, and thereby known as herself. How do I want to be known.”
“But I've discovered being a writer is an ongoing apprenticeship, just like everything else in life that matters to me-being a mother, a wife, a daughter, or simply a woman alive in the world, content to be myself. Today at thirty-two, I am glad to wake up each day and begin.”