What a Woman Must Do, By Faith Sullivan

A few years ago, when Minnesota author Faith Sullivan’s novel The Empress of One (for which she won the Milkweed National Fiction Prize) had just been released, a friend of ours mentioned that Sullivan had recently accepted an invitation to attend her diddly little neighborhood book group as a guest author. How cool is that? So Minnesotan. Anyway, our friend could not speak highly enough of Sullivan, how stunning it was to hear her read from her work, how approachable she was, how intelligent, articulate, and just plain friendly. All of this makes the thought of attending a reading of Sullivan’s latest work, What a Woman Must Do, that much more alluring. Set in the fictional town of Harvester, Minnesota in 1952, What a Woman Must Do traces the connections of three women: Bess, 17, Harriet, 39, and Kate, 59, all of whom have been affected by the car accident that killed Bess’s parents. The novel pulls readers through the twists of destiny—death, love, and dreams of the future—that threaten to come between the three women. Sullivan, who grew up in Minnesota towns herself, applies her deft talents as a writer with believable authenticity to the rhythms of small-town life, while she concurrently addresses the eternal themes of love, loyalty, and family. Sullivan reads at Ruminator Books in Minneapolis on June 3, (651) 699-0587