Fruit in the family

Sue Monk Kidd collaborates with her daughter on a memoir that is equal parts travel narrative, writing guide and psychic excavation. Beginning with a trip to Athens to celebrate Kidd’s 50th birthday and Taylor’s college graduation, the women make pilgrimages to churches and goddess shrines in Greece and France, seeking the wisdom to create lives of meaning—at the start of womanhood and at its waning edge. The authors take turns reading the Penguin Audio edition, and their softly Southern-accented voices highlight their differences in age and perspective. Aspiring novelists and fans of Kidd’s best-selling The Secret Life of Bees will enjoy a peek into the writer’s process. It’s all here, from the moment she prayed to a Greek statue of Mary to make her a novelist, to the time—nearly 10 years later—when she was thrilled to find her book was a quiz answer on Jeopardy!.