silver sparrow
also by TAYARI JONES
SILVER SPARROW
a novel by
Tayari Jones
Published by
ALGONQUIN BOOKS OF CHAPEL HILL
Post Office Box 2225
Chapel Hil , North Carolina 27515-2225
a division of
Workman Publishing
225 Varick Street
New York, New York 10014
© 2011 by Tayari Jones.
Al rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
Published simultaneously in Canada by Thomas Al en & Son Limited.
“A Daughter is a Colony,” on page vii, copyright © Natasha Trethewey.
This is a work of fiction. While, as in al fiction, the literary perceptions and insights are based on experience, al names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jones, Tayari.
Silver sparrow : a novel / by Tayari Jones. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-56512-990-0
1. African American families — Fiction. 2. Polygamy — Fiction.
3. African American teenage girls — Fiction. 4. Sisters — Fiction.
5. Mothers and daughters — Fiction. 6. Fathers and daughters — Fiction.
7. Atlanta (Ga.) — Fiction. 8. Domestic fiction. I. Title.
PS3610 O63S56 2011
813?.6 — dc22 2010048098
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
First Edition
A Daughter is a Colony
a territory, a progeny,
a spitting image
like Athena sprung
from her father’s head:
