Kate Vaiden - by Reynolds Price (Paperback)

About the Book

Reissued to coincide with the publication of Price's new novel, "Roxanna Slade", this bestselling chronicle of a lifetime of joy and sadness--narrated by the feisty, irrepressible woman who lived it--"is a wise and wonderful story told by an artist at the peak of his powers" ("Chicago Tribune").

Book Synopsis

0ne of the most feisty, spellbinding and engaging heroines in modern fiction captures the essence of her own life in this contemporary American odyssey born of red-clay land and small-town people. We meet Kate at a crucial moment in middle age when she begins to yearn to see the son she abandoned when she was seventeen. But if she decides to seek him, will he understand her? Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, Kate Vaiden is a penetrating psychological portrait of an ordinary woman in extraordinary circumstances, a story as joyous, tragic, comic and compelling as life itself.

Review Quotes

Chicago Tribune Book World Surely his finest work so far. A wise and wonderful story told by an artist at the peak of his powers...you will want to meet Kate Vaiden and get to know her. And in the end...you will want to stand up for Reynolds Price.

San Francisco Chronicle May well be Reynolds Price's best novel.

The New York Times Book Review Intense and powerful...the voice of Mr. Price's heroine blows like fresh air across the page.

The Washington Post Book World Beautifully written and skillfully narrated...a novel for all seasons.

USA Today You won't hear many voices in your life that are as interesting as Kate Vaiden's.

About the Author

Reynolds Price (1933-2011) was born in Macon, North Carolina. Educated at Duke University and, as a Rhodes Scholar, at Merton College, Oxford University, he taught at Duke beginning in 1958 and was the James B. Duke Professor of English at the time of his death. His first short stories, and many later ones, are published in his Collected Stories. A Long and Happy Life was published in 1962 and won the William Faulkner Award for a best first novel. Kate Vaiden was published in 1986 and won the National Book Critics Circle Award. The Good Priest's Son in 2005 was his fourteenth novel. Among his thirty-seven volumes are further collections of fiction, poetry, plays, essays, and translations. Price is a member of both the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and his work has been translated into seventeen languages.