The Invention of Wings: A Novel

This is the first book by Sue Monk Kidd that I've read. I normally avoid any Oprah book picks, because I'm not a fan, but I am glad that I took a chance on this one.The Invention of Wings follows the events in the lives of two women: Hetty "Handful" and Sarah Grimke. Both women are enslaved by the times into which they were born. Hetty is black and born to a slave in pre-Civil War Charleston, SC. Sarah's prominent family owns Hetty and her mother, as well as many other slaves who work in and around the house. Sarah's enslavement may not be as obvious as Hetty's, but even as a white female in the 19th century, she didn't have rights to property, inheritance or education.At age 10, Hetty is given to Sarah as her 11th birthday present. Sarah has always felt out of place in her family, sneaking in to her father's library to read, though such behavior is discourage. She can't reconcile herself with the idea of owning another human being, so she tries to refuse the "gift." But her mother is firm and so Sarah sets out to make Hetty's life as easy as possible. She also promises Hetty's mother that she will set Hetty free someday.Over the next 35 years, we follow their lives. Their stories are told from their own viewpoints, switching back and forth. Sarah grows increasingly detached from her family and the South's refusal to change. She struggles to find her purpose in life, feeling that it's more than just what is expected of women: marriage and procreation. Her views force her from her church and she moves north to find a place where she can fit in. Eventually her sister, Nina, who shares her beliefs, joins her.Hetty, for her part, stays just inside the lines of obedience. She witnesses unthinkable acts against her people, including her own mother. Sarah teaches her how to read, which is strictly forbidden, and she is punished when her education is discovered. However, Hetty chooses to be free in her mind, even though her body is owned by someone else.What's most intriguing to me about this story is that Sarah Grimke and her sister, Nina (Angelina), were real. I had never heard of them until this book, but they were born into a wealthy Charleston family and they did become outcasts for their views on slavery and racial equality.What amazed me the most was that when they delivered speeches about abolition, they were held in high regard by their male peers. However, once they cross into women's rights, they are told to stop diluting the message. Being a white female apparently was still being less than a man of any color.Hetty and her family are fictional, but they are a faithful representation of the lives of those born into slavery during this time.The writing is so well done, I was literally holding my breath during the final scenes of the book. I don't think I've ever been so anxious about anything in my own life as I was Hetty and Sarah in those moments.Some favorite points:•There was so much in the world to be had and not had. (Hetty)•She’d immersed herself in forbidden privileges , yes, but mostly in the belief she was worthy of those privileges. What she’d done was not a revolt, it was a baptism. I saw then what I hadn’t seen before, that I was very good at despising slavery in the abstract, in the removed and anonymous masses, but in the concrete, intimate flesh of the girl beside me, I’d lost the ability to be repulsed by it. I’d grown comfortable with the particulars of evil. There’s a frightful muteness that dwells at the center of all unspeakable things, and I had found my way into it. (Sarah)•The worst troubling thing he told me was how his neighbor down the street— a free black named Mr. Robert Smyth— owned three slaves. Now what you supposed to do with something like that? Mr. Vesey had to take me to the man’s house to meet the slaves before I allowed any truth to it. I didn’t know whether this Mr. Smyth was behaving like white people, or if it just showed something vile about all people. (Hetty)•Be careful, you can get enslaved twice, once in your body and once in your mind. (Hetty)•I hadn’t really expected Lucretia to respond, but after a moment, she spoke. “God fills us with all sorts of yearnings that go against the grain of the world— but the fact those yearnings often come to nothing, well, I doubt that’s God’s doing.” She cut her eyes at me and smiled. “I think we know that’s men’s doing.” She leaned toward me. “Life is arranged against us, Sarah. And it’s brutally worse for Handful and her mother and sister. We’re all yearning for a wedge of sky, aren’t we? I suspect God plants these yearnings in us so we'll at least try and change the courseof things. We must try, that’s all.” (Sarah)•That’s what I was born for— not the ministry, not the law, but abolition . I’ve come to know it only this night, but it has always been the tree in the acorn. (Sarah)•“History is not just facts and events. History is also a pain in the heart and we repeat history until we are able to make another’s pain in the heart our own.” (Julius Lester)Highly recommend.© Angela Risner 2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from Amazon or Angela Risner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Angela Risner with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

When I read a book, it's like choosing a film. I research it by reading reviews. Not afraid of 'spoilers', I use the commentary of others as touch points as I read the material myself. Some people don't like 'spoilers' but I embrace all that information as my own back story to enrich my reading experience. Before I read this book, I read the interview Ms. Kidd gave in the January 2014 O' Magazine. Then, I went to Amazon to check on it and read some of the critiques. One of the comments from two of the reviews had to do with the 'notes' (too many) provided by Oprah. I am thinking, it's a book club offering, if they do not want to read Oprah's comments they certainly are not obligated. I personally read all her comments and it was as if we were in a book club together and so it added to my reading experience. I didn't think there were too many Oprah notes and actually thought she could have commented more in the middle of the book. I personally highlighted all the words I looked up for definition as a way to dig deeper myself (one of the things I love most about Kindle books, dictionary is only a tap away).This is a favorite genre of mine; it's a biography written as a as novel during a period in history. I felt very prepared to give this book everything I had and I was not disappointed. I was inspired. The parallel narration worked for me. I spent time with Sarah in her head and then the next chapter I was with Hetty. It was flawless, transitioning between the two women. Their individual voices were always clearly their own. Picturing the mansion was a little trickier. My daughter and I visited Mt Vernon and took a tour of the house and estate complete with the 'warming kitchen' and slave quarters but his estate was in the country and this story took place in an urban mansion in Charleston, SC so I did a lot of creative set designing in my head. It was afterward while reading all the notes and an interview with Sue Monk Kidd that I found out that the Grimke mansion is still standing and she had taken a tour of it. I actually went on line to see pictures of mansions from that era. I wished she had a picture in the book as a reference. I viewed 12 Years a Slave which did have a mansion similar to book's description. I also noticed some details like the 'slave clothes' that she described in the book made out of unbleached muslin and the reading of the Bible verses to the slaves as a way to convince them and possibly themselves that slave ownership was sanctified. One of the books I read last year,The Healing by Jonathan Odell,came to mind while reading this novel. In that book, he articulated the aspect of the mindset of people in captivity. The Healer in Odell's story recognized that aspect of the human spirit and its relevance in becoming free. In Kidd's book, Hattie had that "you can't own me" idea already in her, cultivated by her mother. Also, they had power in their craft, something that they had that the 'master' needed. The ability to sew, quilt and ultimately tell their story. Sarah, on the other hand had to discover her own truth organically, no doubt influenced by her experience viewing a beating of a slave as a four year old girl hidden from view. Kidd elucidated in the back of my edition what was actually factual and what she created. The time she took with details was thrilling for me as a reader. She commented that while she was writing her book, her husband said that she spent more time in the 19th century than in the 21st. I have been spending some time in the 19th century as well, having just finished Elizabeth Gilbert's book The Signature of All Things which takes place in that time period as well. This book was so well-written, well-researched and relevant that it could easily be required reading in a woman's studies curriculum. Honestly, I cannot think of anything more thrilling than to be inside a work of art such as this book where I can totally trust the author as well as feel that I have actually made a contribution as a person by sharing the painful history of our country and be inspired to speak my own truth. This book changed me. It changed how I looked at things in my own life and how I respond. Sarah had an uphill battle all the way. She had to turn her back on everything she had been taught to speak her truth and often under duress and danger. If she can do that, then I actually owe it to her to do my best every day to speak authentically. Honestly, it's the only way any of us will ever be free. Of course, I recommend the book but would qualify it by saying for those people ready to take a journey that will no doubt transform you if you are willing.

I bought this book because I enjoyed another book by the same author, The Secret Life of Bees, which was an excellent, thought-provoking read. This book didn't disappoint me either.It documents the life of Sarah Grimké - a character whom I didn't realise actually existed in history, and did a lot towards the abolishment of slavery and women's rights. It also follows the fictional account of a slave, Hetty 'Handful' Grimké, her mother Charlotte Grimké, and the rest of the slaves and Grimké household. All of the members of the Grimké family are based on real people, the slaves, as I found from the authors note at the back, are fictional accounts, but that doesn't take away from the poignancy as what these characters went through is undoubtedly what a lot of slaves will have gone through, too.Upon being presented with Hetty as a gift for her eleventh birthday, Sarah Grimké begins her journey of disgust and revolution regarding slave labour. She and Hetty strike up perhaps an unusual friendship, considering Sarah's sister, Mary Grimké, also had a slave and had no such relationship. I really enjoyed Hetty and Sarah's relationship, it wasn't forced, and you could see the pain for both of them - for Sarah not being able to help Hetty, and for Hetty, who was the same as Sarah in her lust for life, except born into the 'wrong' colour skin for those times. I also enjoyed Hetty's relationship with her mother, Charlotte, and both of their fiery passion for freedom - not even freedom, just to be treated like a normal [white] person.Some years later, the last Grimké sibling is born, Nina Grimké. Sarah projects her passion onto Nina, even becoming her Godmother. The two share a remarkable bond, with Nina being the bullheaded one who wants to get things done asap, and Sarah being the one that theorises and takes her time, but still wanting to get things done. The two did so much, as documented in this fact-based fiction book, to help the rights of slaves and also the rights of women, through a lot of heartache, pain, belief and headstrongness.I've never really thought about the plight of slaves, because it seems quite far in history to me. What I read in this novel disgusted me - that anyone can be treated in such an inferior way solely due to the colour of their skin. Sadly, racism is still prevalent in today's society, but at least we, as a society, have come on leaps and bounds from when this novel was set in terms of recognising it, and treating everyone as an equal.A beautifully written, haunting, thought-provoking book that will most likely stay with me for a long time.

I am not sure quite how to review this book, but I will try. Firstly, I'm a Brit but fascinated and intrigued by the history of the American South and the story of the emancipation and suffering endured by slavery. I read Gone with the Wind some forty years ago and more recently The Help and The Underground Railroad plus a university course about the American South which is impossible to separate from its history of slavery. If any reader has an interest - as I do i - in these topics, then this is a well written and fairly absorbing book. It covers a lot of themes and begins when Handful is given to Sarah as her slave on her eleventh birthday and Sarah tries to bestow upon the girl her freedom, without success. The author's aim was not to write a thinly fictionalized account of Sarah's life but a thickly imagined story inspired by her life. She splits her story between Hetty (or Handful) and Sarah one character real, and one imagined. What happened, for me, as a reader,) was that I was more drawn to the chapters about the fictionalized character, than the real person and as a book, it grew a little worthy and heavy without tugging at my heart as it perhaps ought to have done. I'm not sure that all the facts about Sarah's crusade were necessary to the story and dragged it a little. Very very glad I read it though and very interesting to learn about Angelina and Sarah Grimke who I had never before heard of.

I heard about this book when Brene Brown interviewed Sue Monk Kidd on her podcast. I already had it on Kindle but had not read it as the story of slavery had put me off, however, after the interview I decided to read this book and I am so glad I did. The book is based on historic facts of the Grimke sisters, Sarah and Angelina, who were white abolitionists as well as feminists. The story is shocking as it tells of a time when slavery was in full force, which is shocking and upsetting by itself, as well as of women who had no voice. Neither the slaves or women had freedom.I found the book inspirational showing how two women can bring about change, which means us women now have freedoms women of earlier generations could only dream about, and the abolition of slavery.

I don't normally read historical, and I'm not a fan of first person narrative, and I especially dislike dual first person narratives, but this book completely won me over. The voices of Sarah and Handful were so distinct that even without the chapter heading, I always knew whose story I was reading and both women became real because they didn't sound the same. The story kept me intrigued from the first page and I didn't want to stop reading. I was about three-quarters through before I realised the story is based on real people - I had never heard of the Grimke sisters and their involvement in abolition of slavery and women's rights. Once I knew that, the story became even more intriguing. For me it ended a little abruptly, but I suspect that was only because I had become so invested in the characters that I wanted to know more. I loved the author's note at the end, explaining the historical and literary choices she made. Beautifully written and with characters I could care about, and an insight into the America of the time. This is the first book I've read by this author but it won't be the last.

It took me a while to get into this but I remembered feeling the same with The Secret Life of Bees so I pushed myself on and on glad I did as I ended up really enjoying this. Well as much as you can ever enjoy a book about slavery that is.Handful and Sarah arent the most likeable of characters in my opinion but it was hard not adore them in their own ways. I felt that their relationship was probably very realistic due to the dynamics, it had a quiet turbulence about it.I didnt know about basket names and what a lovely concept! I hope somewhere in the world this tradition lives on.What an awful period in history that we must force ourselves to continue to read about as it seems we havent learnt from it fully quite yet.4 stars.