author of The American Daughters
Keynote: October 24, 7:30 p.m.
Maurice Carlos Ruffin returns as keynote author with his second novel, The American Daughters. Set before, during, and long after the Civil War, the novel is an account of Ady, a young woman who was sold into slavery; escapes with her mother in an attempt to rejoin the Maroon community where she was born; is recaptured, raised and educated by her enslaver in New Orleans; works at an inn with free women of color; and becomes involved with an organization of resistance fighters and spies.
The New York Times praises The American Daughters as a “stirring new novel” that joins the ranks of Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, Kaitlyn Greenidge and Colson Whitehead to “reanimate a long-suppressed history through sweeping stories of people whose free labor built this country.”
Ruffin has previously published the novel We Cast A Shadow and the story collection The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You. A New Orleans native, Ruffin is a professor of Creative Writing at LSU, and he was the recipient of the 2023 Louisiana Writer Award.
