Online Reading Challenge discussion

Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez

SUMMARY

Inspired by true events that rocked the nation, a profoundly moving novel about a Black nurse in post-segregation Alabama who blows the whistle on a terrible wrong done to her patients, from the New York Times bestselling author of Wench.

Montgomery, Alabama, 1973. Fresh out of nursing school, Civil Townsend has big plans to make a difference, especially in her African American community. At the Montgomery Family Planning Clinic, she intends to help women make their own choices for their lives and bodies.

But when her first week on the job takes her down a dusty country road to a worn-down one-room cabin, she’s shocked to learn that her new patients, Erica and India, are children—just eleven and thirteen years old. Neither of the Williams sisters has even kissed a boy, but they are poor and Black, and for those handling the family’s welfare benefits, that’s reason enough to have the girls on birth control. As Civil grapples with her role, she takes India, Erica, and their family into her heart. Until one day she arrives at the door to learn the unthinkable has happened, and nothing will ever be the same for any of them.

Decades later, with her daughter grown and a long career in her wake, Dr. Civil Townsend is ready to retire, to find her peace, and to leave the past behind. But there are people and stories that refuse to be forgotten. That must not be forgotten.

Because history repeats what we don’t remember.
(Summary provided by the author)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dolen Perkins-Valdez is the New York Times bestselling author of Wench (2010), Balm (2015), and most recently Take My Hand (2022). Take My Hand was named a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by Newsweek, San Francisco Chronicle, Essence, NBC News, and elsewhere. The novel was a finalist for a Goodreads Choice Award and named a Top 20 Book of the Year by the Editors at Amazon. It was awarded the 2023 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work-Fiction and the 2023 BCALA Award for Fiction. The audiobook version of Take My Hand was named a Best of 2022 by Audible.

The American Bar Association recently awarded Take My Hand its prestigious Silver Gavel Award which recognizes an "outstanding work that fosters the American public's understanding of law and the legal system."

In 2011, Wench was a finalist for two NAACP Image Awards and the Hurston-Wright Legacy Award for fiction, and in 2017, HarperCollins released Wench as one of eight "Olive Titles," limited edition modern classics that included books by Edward P. Jones, Louise Erdrich, and Zora Neale Hurston.

Dolen has established herself as a pre-eminent chronicler of American historical life. In 2013, she wrote the introduction to a special edition of Solomon Northup's Twelve Years a Slave, published by Simon & Schuster, which became a New York Times bestseller. She followed that with an introduction to Elizabeth Keckly's Behind the Scenes, published in 2016, and the forthcoming 75th anniversary of George Orwell's 1984 which will be published by Penguin Random House in 2023.

Dolen is a three-time nominee for a United States Artists Fellowship and is currently Associate Professor in the Literature Department at American University and lives in Washington, DC with her family.
(Biography provided by the author)

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

• Perkins-Valdez used the real-life 1973 case Relf v. Weinberger as a launching point for writing this novel. Did you know about this moment in history or similar stories? If not, why do you think these important historical moments are not more widely known?

• Take My Hand is told through the eyes of present-day Civil revealing to her grown daughter what happened in 1973. Why do you think the author chose to tell the story this way? Why is it important for us to pass on our family histories?

• History repeats what we don’t remember. With infamous cases like the Tuskegee syphilis experiment and the use of Henrietta Lacks’s cells without her knowledge, what do you think is the importance of medical ethics in today’s society?

• So many people in this novel have good intentions—even Mrs. Seager believes she is doing what’s right. What are the dangers of good intentions? What responsibility do we have from the fallout of our “good deeds”?

• Civil and the nurses at the clinic try to make amends for the unintentional harm they have done to patients over the years. Do you think redemption was possible for them?

• Present-day Civil goes to visit her old friend Alicia. In what ways have the two women changed since their days of working together at the clinic?

• In the book, Civil recounts, “Our little family managed to live dignified in undignified times. Daddy shined his shoes every morning. Mama wore earrings. These little acts might seem simple to you, but baby, let me tell you. They held back the storm.” What is the significance of living “dignified” for both the Townsend and the Williams families?

• How do you think India and Erica’s story would have unfolded if Civil hadn’t stepped into their lives?

• Why do you think Civil never married?

• Do you think Civil was truly attracted to Mace Williams, or do you think it was a product of Civil’s romantic notion of what a hero is?

• The ideas of being a savior and being an advocate are important themes in the book. Who in your mind was a savior? Who in your mind was an advocate? What are examples of ways these roles are different?

• The book is set in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1973. What is the importance of time and place in the novel?
(Discussion questions provided by Penguin Random House)