Tales from the Heart: True Stories from My Childhood

Winner of the 2018 New Academy Prize in Literature

In this collection of autobiographical essays, Maryse Conde vividly evokes the relationships and events that gave her childhood meaning: discovering her parents’ feelings of alienation; her first crush; a falling out with her best friend; the death of her beloved grandmother; her first encounter with racism.

These gemlike vignettes capture the spirit of Conde’s fiction: haunting, powerful, poignant, and leavened with a streak of humor.