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The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett – Most-Talked About Southern Historical Fiction In 2020

Are you looking for southern coming of age literary fiction? Don’t miss The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett. Discover a The Vanishing Half book summary, book reviews, and book information here.

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett book cover with swirls of blue, pink, yellow, and orange colors

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The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett Book Information

Author: Brit Bennett
Genre: Southern Fiction | Book About Racism & Race | Women’s & Family Fiction
Pages: 352
Publisher: Riverhead Books
Publication Date: June 2020

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The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett Summary

The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it’s not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it’s everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters’ storylines intersect?

Weaving together multiple strands and generations of this family, from the Deep South to California, from the 1950s to the 1990s, Brit Bennett produces a story that is at once a riveting, emotional family story and a brilliant exploration of the American history of passingLooking well beyond issues of race, The Vanishing Half considers the lasting influence of the past as it shapes a person’s decisions, desires, and expectations, and explores some of the multiple reasons and realms in which people sometimes feel pulled to live as something other than their origins.

As with her New York Times-bestselling debut The Mothers, Brit Bennett offers an engrossing page-turner about family and relationships that is immersive and provocative, compassionate and wise.

Riverhead Books

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About The Author, Brit Bennett

Brit Bennet grew up in Southern California. She graduated from Stanford University and has an MFA in fiction from the University of Michigan. Read more about Brit Bennett.

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