Southern Fiction Author Sheri Reynolds Releases First New Novel in a Decade

Feminist and lesbian publishing house Bywater Books is honored to welcome novelist Sheri Reynolds to its roster of authors. Reynolds, who returns to fiction writing after a decade focused on teaching, will publish her newest novel, The Tender Grave through Bywater Books in March 2021.

“Reynolds is a wonderful storyteller and master of pastoral imagery.”

– The New York Times Book Review

From the author of the Oprah Book Club selection and New York Times #1 bestseller, The Rapture of Canaan, and steeped in the rich tradition of Southern writers like Carson McCullers and Sue Monk Kidd, comes The Tender Grave, a gripping story of two estranged sisters who find their unlikely way toward forgiveness—and each other—through a repugnant and disturbing set of circumstances.

At age 17, Dori participates in a hate crime against a gay boy from her school and runs away to escape prosecution—and her own harrowing childhood. In her pocket, she carries the address of an older, half-sister she’s never met. She has no idea that her sister, Teresa, is married to another woman, or that Teresa and Jen have tried and failed repeatedly to start their own family. When Dori and Teresa finally meet, they’re forced to confront that, while they don’t like or understand one another, they are inextricably bound in ways that transcend their differences. Together, the sisters discover that the shifting currents of family and connection can sometimes run deeper than the prevailing tides of abandonment and estrangement.

In The Tender Grave, Reynolds weaves complex themes of parenting, forgiveness, guilt, and accountability into a lyrical and lushly woven tapestry that chronicles our enduring search for heart, home, and healing.

Says Bywater Books publisher, Salem West, “Sheri Reynolds is a master seamstress of character, story, and metaphor. And through The Tender Grave, she stitches together a glorious patchwork quilt of contemporary southern women framed like broken ephemera and distressed by a lifetime of doubt that flows freely from their haunted childhoods.”

About the Author

Sheri Reynolds is the author of the seven novels and the full-length play, Orabelle’s Wheelbarrow. She teaches creative writing and literature at Old Dominion University, where she serves as its Department Chair of English and is the Ruth and Perry Morgan Chair of Southern Literature. Sheri previously taught at Virginia Commonwealth University, The College of William and Mary, and Davidson College. She and her wife live in Cape Charles on Virginia’s eastern shore.

The Tender Grave by Sheri Reynolds
Publication Date: March 16, 2021 by Bywater Books
Distributed to the trade by Consortium Book Sales and Distribution
Fiction / Literary / Southern / Women / LGBT / Lesbian
Paperback ISBN 978-1-61294-193-6—$16.95
eBook ISBN 978-1-61294-194-3—$9.99

About Bywater Books

Bywater Books is dedicated to excellence in lesbian and feminist publishing. We produce notable commercial fiction for lesbians, feminists, and all readers. For more information about Bywater Books, our authors, and our titles, please visit our website: www.bywaterbooks.com/