Some of the themes from Homegoing still run through this, the questions about what we make of our lives after we have experienced or been handed down this trauma from the older generations - that's something that I continue to be interested in. This felt like such a different kind of story that I wanted to tell, much quieter. I don't think I was trying to take on another, many-century project again. YAA GYASI: From the beginning, this seemed very clearly to be a story that was going to be a lot more intimate. She talked to Shondaland from her apartment in Brooklyn, where she has been sheltering from the coronavirus.ĬAROLYN KELLOGG: Congratulations on the new novel! Homegoing was this huge epic, and Transcendent Kingdom is much more internal. Gyasi is all right-brain creative, and her family, while Pentecostal, didn’t face the same travails as the family in her novel. Like Gifty, Gyasi is from Ghana and grew up in Huntsville, but their paths split.

Woven into that is the question of faith - she was raised Pentecostal - and the tension between science and belief. But she’s haunted by her family - her father, gone back to Ghana, and her brother, a star athlete turned addict. She was a poor girl from Huntsville, Alabama who made it to Harvard then Stanford, propelled by her intelligence and will. All along, Gifty is, circuitously, relating the story of her life. Here’s a full list of every novel she’s chosen for her book club, plus the latest pick to dive into.And yet, there’s so much to tell.

Almost a year later, Jenna’s book club has taken off, and the Today anchor continues to release one special pick a month.

“Why not do what I do in my personal life on television?” she asked herself. Jenna started Book of the Month with Today to form a community with other people, like herself, who love to read. “She found this companionship that she didn’t have with a sibling in books. Jenna said her mother, being an only child, especially inspired her to read. “We never had a TV in our room, at least until, really, college, so it was the way that I entertained myself.” It was just part of our nightly routine,” she told Goodreads, adding it was how they were raised. “I don’t remember a night when I was a little girl that I went to bed without one of my parents reading to my sister, Barbara, and me. She also grew up reading books and has her parents to thank for that. The Today with Hoda & Jenna star has co-authored two books, Everything Beautiful in Its Time and Sisters First, with her mom Laura Bush and her sister Barbara Bush, respectively.

Jenna launched her book club in March 2019, and it’s clear that the NBC anchor is a true book lover at heart. If you ask Jenna Bush Hager or Reese Witherspoon, they’ll happily inform you that Wednesday evening book clubbing is the new Friday night bar clubbing.

Transcendent kingdom goodreads