One City, One Book 2021

Homegoing is the selection for the 2021 Nashua Reads: One City, One Book program.

• Meet author Yaa Gyasi on Sunday, October 17, 2021.
• Join us for other Nashua Reads events related to the themes of Homegoing.

About the book

Born in Ghana in the 1700s, Effia and Esi are half-sisters, unknown to one another. Effia marries an English colonial and lives a life of luxury in his Ghanaian castle. Esi, captured in a tribal war, is shipped to America and sold into slavery. Homegoing follows the lives of these two women and of eight generations of their descendants. From the Gold Coast of Africa to Mississippi and Harlem, through the Civil War and the Great Migration, the novel illuminates the injustices of racism and slavery over the past 300 years.

Read an excerpt

You can read an excerpt of the book here.

About the author

Yaa Gyasi was born in Ghana and raised in Huntsville, Alabama. She earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Stanford University and a master’s in fine arts from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where she held a Dean’s Graduate Research Fellowship. She lives in New York City.

Yaa’s honors include the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, the PEN/Hemingway Award for Best First Novel, the American Book Award, and the National Book Foundation’s Under 35 award.

Homegoing, published in 2016, was Yaa’s first novel. When her second novel, Transcendent Kingdom, was released in 2020 it became an instant bestseller. For more information on Yaa Gyasi, please visit prhspeakers.com.

 

Get your copy now

The library has over 100 copies of Homegoing, including print, e-book, and audio versions. So reserve your copy and pick it up at the library. Read it; talk about it with your friends, coworkers, and neighbors; and then meet the author with us this fall.

Our sponsors

Yaa Gyasi’s appearance is sponsored by:

• The Friends of the Nashua Public Library
• The Ella Anderson Trust

Related documentaries

Check out this list of documentaries related to the themes of Homegoing. All are available for free streaming with your Nashua Public Library card.

Youth Nashua Reads

This year kids can participate in Nashua Reads too! Two great books, Clayton Byrd Goes Underground and One Crazy Summer, both by Rita Williams-Garcia, have been selected as the 2021 youth titles. And we’re pleased to announce that Rita Williams-Garcia will visit Nashua virtually on Saturday, October 23, at 2 pm. Register for this Zoom event now!

Questions?

For more information about Nashua Reads, contact Carol Luers Eyman at (603) 589-4610 or carol.eyman@nashualibrary.org. 

About Nashua Reads: One City, One Book

The goal of the One City, One Book program is to get as many Nashuans as possible to read the same book and talk about it with friends, coworkers, and neighbors. The Nashua program is now in its 19th year.