Zeal: A Novel
The New York Times bestselling author of This Will Be My Undoing and Caul Baby returns with an epic multigenerational novel that illuminates the legacy of slavery and the power of romantic love.“A beautiful tale.” —Jason Reynolds, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Twenty-four Seconds from Now
Harlem, 2019. Ardelia and Oliver are hosting their engagement party. As the guests begin to leave, he hands her a love letter on a yellowing, crumbling piece of paper. . . .Natchez, 1865. Discharged from the Union Army as a free man, Harrison returns to Mississippi to reunite with Tirzah. At the Freedmen’s Bureau, he catches the eye of a woman who’s determined to thwart his efforts to find his beloved. After tragedy strikes, Harrison resigns himself to a life with her.Meanwhile in Louisiana, the newly free Tirzah is teaching at a freedmen’s school and discovers an advertisement looking for her. Though she knows her beloved Harrison must have placed it, the risks of fleeing are too great.Spanning more than a hundred and fifty years, Morgan Jerkins’s extraordinary novel intertwines the stories of these star-crossed lovers and their descendants. As Tirzah’s family moves across the country during the Great Migration, they challenge authority with devastating consequences, while the legacy of heartbreak and loss continues through the lives of Harrison’s progeny.When Ardelia meets Oliver, she finds that his family’s history is as full of secrets and omissions as her own. Could their connection be a cosmic reconciliation satisfying the unfulfilled desires of their ancestors, or will the weight of the past, present, and future tear them apart?
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The New York Times bestselling author of This Will Be My Undoing and Caul Baby returns with an epic multigenerational novel that illuminates the legacy of slavery and the power of romantic love.“A beautiful tale.” —Jason Reynolds, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Twenty-four Seconds from Now
Harlem, 2019. Ardelia and Oliver are hosting their engagement party. As the guests begin to leave, he hands her a love letter on a yellowing, crumbling piece of paper. . . .Natchez, 1865. Discharged from the Union Army as a free man, Harrison returns to Mississippi to reunite with Tirzah. At the Freedmen’s Bureau, he catches the eye of a woman who’s determined to thwart his efforts to find his beloved. After tragedy strikes, Harrison resigns himself to a life with her.Meanwhile in Louisiana, the newly free Tirzah is teaching at a freedmen’s school and discovers an advertisement looking for her. Though she knows her beloved Harrison must have placed it, the risks of fleeing are too great.Spanning more than a hundred and fifty years, Morgan Jerkins’s extraordinary novel intertwines the stories of these star-crossed lovers and their descendants. As Tirzah’s family moves across the country during the Great Migration, they challenge authority with devastating consequences, while the legacy of heartbreak and loss continues through the lives of Harrison’s progeny.When Ardelia meets Oliver, she finds that his family’s history is as full of secrets and omissions as her own. Could their connection be a cosmic reconciliation satisfying the unfulfilled desires of their ancestors, or will the weight of the past, present, and future tear them apart?
