The Invention of Wings

　　暢銷作家蘇．蒙克．奇德感性書寫19世紀女性追尋自我、渴望自由的不凡旅程
　　入選歐普拉讀書俱樂部2.0選書

　　故事背景在19世紀初美國的查爾斯頓城，11歲的富家千金Sarah Grimke選中10歲的Hetty做她的婢女，兩人一起成長，共同交換彼此的喜怒哀樂。Sarah明白身旁的女僕是多麼嚮往自由，但礙於當時社會文化加諸在女性身上的枷鎖，使得她只能坐困愁城，哪兒都去不了。

　　小說脈絡順著Sarah與Hetty相識後的日子延續下去，作者一口氣寫出35年間這對主僕精彩絕倫的非凡旅程。她們不斷和命運搏鬥，勇敢地為愛忍受，卻在無意間改寫了對方的人生劇本，同時發展出一段剪不斷理還亂的複雜關係。

　　憑恃著與生俱來的敘事天份，蘇．蒙克．奇德在《The Invention of Wings》裡盡情發揮所長，成就這本高潮迭起，滿懷希望、渴望自由與證明女性存在價值的深情鉅著。（文／博客來編譯）

　　From the celebrated author of The Secret Life of Bees, a magnificent novel about two unforgettable American women
 
　　Writing at the height of her narrative and imaginative gifts, Sue Monk Kidd presents a masterpiece of hope, daring, the quest for freedom, and the desire to have a voice in the world—and it is now the newest Oprah’s Book Club 2.0 selection.

　　Hetty “Handful” Grimke, an urban slave in early nineteenth century Charleston, yearns for life beyond the suffocating walls that enclose her within the wealthy Grimke household. The Grimke’s daughter, Sarah, has known from an early age she is meant to do something large in the world, but she is hemmed in by the limits imposed on women.

　　Kidd’s sweeping novel is set in motion on Sarah’s eleventh birthday, when she is given ownership of ten year old Handful, who is to be her handmaid. We follow their remarkable journeys over the next thirty five years, as both strive for a life of their own, dramatically shaping each other’s destinies and forming a complex relationship marked by guilt, defiance, estrangement and the uneasy ways of love.

　　As the stories build to a riveting climax, Handful will endure loss and sorrow, finding courage and a sense of self in the process. Sarah will experience crushed hopes, betrayal, unrequited love, and ostracism before leaving Charleston to find her place alongside her fearless younger sister, Angelina, as one of the early pioneers in the abolition and women’s rights movements.

　　Inspired by the historical figure of Sarah Grimke, Kidd goes beyond the record to flesh out the rich interior lives of all of her characters, both real and invented, including Handful’s cunning mother, Charlotte, who courts danger in her search for something better.

　　This exquisitely written novel is a triumph of storytelling that looks with unswerving eyes at a devastating wound in American history, through women whose struggles for liberation, empowerment, and expression will leave no reader unmoved.