TT #15 Books About Three Generations of Women

I enjoy reading, and I will pick up just about anything. On my bedside table at this moment are Eat, Pray, Love; Oxymoronica; A Walk in the Woods, and Miss Read. But what I often enjoy is a good story about three generations of women. I love to read a story through the eyes of women because their families are usually close by. I have a favorite. Both my daughter and I have read it multiple times; in fact, it is literally falling apart. It is #13 in the list below, but I was surprised to find that there are hundreds of books about three generations of women. I have listed twelve, some of which I have read and some I wish to read, and my personal favorite. If you read the reviews of it on Amazon you will see that I am not alone in my enjoyment of that story.

1. Circle of Three--Patricia Gaffney. The lives of grandmother Dana, mother Carrie, and daughter Ruth are instantly altered by the untimely death of Carrie's husband, Stephen.



2. Charms for the Easy Life---Kaye Gibbons This new novel depicts three generations of Southern women living together during World War II.



3. Wild Swans---Jung Chang. The author recounts the evocative, unsettling, and insistently gripping story of how three generations of women in her family fared in the political maelstrom of China during the 20th century.



4. A Yellow Raft in Blue Water---Michael Dorris. This spare generational novel presents Rayona, Christine and "Aunt" Ida, Native American mothers and daughters bonded by blood and secrets.



5. Jump at the Sun---Kim McLarin. McLarin (Taming It Down) weaves the stories of three generations of mothers and daughters in astringent prose ("You couldn't be expected to live without them, but you'd better remember at all times, even with the good ones, that it was you against them," Grace muses of the wild cards that are men). Her characters chafe against the bonds of poverty, racism and feminine stereotypes, but their deeper struggle is to resolve their longing for fulfillment with ties of the heart.



6. Unburnable---Marie-elena John. This compelling first novel traces the fortunes of three generations of women from the small Caribbean Island of Dominica. Matilda, descended from African slaves, was a famous healer and possible murderer.



7. Three Generations---Yom Sang-seop. Three Generations is a classic work of Korean fiction following the tense dynamics of the Jo family in 1930s Japanese-occupied Seoul.



8. Moon Women---Pamela Duncan. Set in western North Carolina, this first novel follows three generations of Moon women during the months of granddaughter Ashley's unplanned pregnancy.



9. Hanna's Daughters---Marianne Fredriksson. Shifting back and forth across time and generations, the story introduces three strong Swedish women: Hanna, her daughter Johanna, and Anna, her granddaughter.



10. Sweet Mandarin--Helen Tse. a true story of three generations of chinese women and their journey from East to West---from brutal poverty in the village to newly prosperous Hong Kong in the 1930s, and then to the UK.



11. African Women: Three Generations--Mark Mathabane. This gripping saga presents a truthful, passionate, and illuminative biography of his great-grandmother, grandmother, and mother in South Africa. Mathabane vividly describes the shocking, heartbreaking stories of each generation of women as they struggle for independent incomes to support themselves and their children; while resisting apartheid, they must also resist the traditions imposed by their own society and the oppresion imposed by their men.



12. Teta, Mother, and Me: Three Generations of Arab Women---Jean Said Makdisi. The author explores the lives of three generations of Palestinian women, deftly illuminating a tumultuous century of modern Middle Eastern history, while raising important questions about the efficacy of ideology, the process of social development and the role of memory.



13. East of the Sun---Barbara Bickmore. This is one of my all-time favorite novels. It is historical romance loosely based on the tumultuous history of 20th century Africa amid the dismantling of European colonialism. It begins with Lilianne Wentworth who travels to Africa as a medical missionary, and it follows her and her daughter and granddaughter for sixty years. What a story!

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others' comments. It’s easy, and fun! Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants