Memphis
Tara M. Stringfellow · 2022
Three generations of Black women in Memphis, spanning the 1960s to the 2020s. Stringfellow's debut weaves love, trauma, and survival in a city that doesn't get enough literary attention. An Oprah's Book Club pick that earned it.
The case against
Stringfellow shuffles four points of view across seven decades in short chapters, and the constant jumping bleeds tension from every timeline just as it builds. Men here come in two models, violent or vanished, which starts to feel like an argument instead of a cast. Joan's painting arc resolves with a tidiness the family's history hasn't earned.
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