Giveaway Time!! Thank you @aaknopf for my gifted copy of ‘Betty‘ by the talented Tiffany McDaniel! And Thank you to Tiffany for the paperback copy (not shown) for the giveaway! (pub 8/18)
“A girl comes of age against the knife.”
So begins the story of Betty Carpenter. Born in a bathtub in 1954 to a Cherokee father & white mother, Betty is the sixth of eight siblings. The world they inhabit is one of poverty & violence–both from outside the family, & also, devastatingly, from within. The lush landscape, rich w/ birdsong, wild fruit, & blazing stars, becomes a kind of refuge for Betty, but when her family’s darkest secrets are brought to light, she has no choice but to reckon with the brutal history hiding in the hills, as well as the heart-wrenching cruelties & incredible characters she encounters in her rural town of Breathed, Ohio.
But despite the hardship she faces, Betty is resilient. Her curiosity about the natural world, her fierce love for her sisters, & her father’s brilliant stories are kindling for the fire of her own imagination, & in the face of all she bears witness to, Betty discovers an escape: she begins to write. She recounts the horrors of her family’s past & present w/ pen & paper & buries them deep in the dirt–moments that had stung her so deeply, she could not tell them, until now.
Inspired by the life of her own mother, Tiffany McDaniel sets out to free the past by telling this heartbreaking yet magical story–a remarkable novel that establishes her as one of the freshest & most important voices in American fiction.
I have only just begun reading ‘Betty‘ & it is what I expected it to be after having read Tiffany’s previous novel of literary fiction, ‘The Summer That Melted Everything‘. It’s absolutely stunning, profoundly moving, heart-wrenchingly raw, & w/ hauntingly poetic prose that builds an entirely authentic world w/in its pages that will utterly consume you.
I will post more about her previous novel soon, but in the meantime, who wants to win a copy of BOTH books? (**Please note: the following information is for FYI only. All entries must be made on Instagram on the giveaway post. Click HERE to go to @mom_loves_reading now)
To enter: (US only)
*Like this post (& maybe some other posts, too while you’re here)
*Must be following @mom_loves_reading & @aaknopf
*Tag a couple friends (Unlimited entries, up to 5 tags per comment)
Bonus entries (5 ea):
*Share post in your feed or stories & tag me. (can be done daily)
*Follow me & share on FB (Mom_Loves_Reading)
*Follow me & retweet on Twitter (momlovesreading)
*Follow my blog (link in bio) & comment on the giveaway post.
US residents only. Giveaway begins 8/21 & ends 8/25 at 11:59pm EST. One winner will get a paperback copy of The Summer That Melted Everything from me (courtesy of Ms McDaniels) & a hardback copy of Betty from Knopf. Giveaway is not affiliated with Instagram. Following then UNfollowing MomLovesReading will get you banned from all future MLR giveaways, & there are a LOT! Giveaway entries on Instagram post only.
The Summer That Melted Everything: (2016, St Martins Press)
Fielding Bliss has never forgotten the summer of 1984:
the year a heatwave scorched the small town of Breathed, Ohio.
The year he became friends with the devil.
When local prosecutor Autopsy Bliss publishes an invitation to the devil to come to the country town of Breathed, Ohio, nobody quite expected that he would turn up. They especially didn’t expect him to turn up a tattered and bruised thirteen-year-old boy.
Fielding, the son of Autopsy, finds the boy outside the courthouse and brings him home, and he is welcomed into the Bliss family. The Blisses believe the boy, who calls himself Sal, is a runaway from a nearby farm town. Then, as a series of strange incidents implicate Sal — and riled by the feverish heatwave baking the town from the inside out — there are some around town who start to believe that maybe Sal is exactly who he claims to be.
But whether he’s a traumatised child or the devil incarnate, Sal is certainly one strange fruit: he talks in riddles, his uncanny knowledge and understanding reaches far outside the realm of a normal child — and ultimately his eerily affecting stories of Heaven, Hell, and earth will mesmerise and enflame the entire town.
Devastatingly beautiful, The Summer That Melted Everything is a captivating story about community, redemption, and the dark places where evil really lies.
Click HERE to add ‘Betty’ to your Goodreads list.
Click HERE to add “The Summer that Melted Everything’ to your Goodreads list.
Click HERE to visit Tiffany McDaniel’s website.
Click HERE to go to the book giveaway on Instagram.
Tiffany McDaniel is a novelist, poet, and visual artist born and raised in Ohio. She is the author of The Summer That Melted Everything and BETTY.
http://www.tiffanymcdaniel.com
*Mom Loves Reading* 