Originally from Port Huron, Terry McMillan (born October 18, 1951, fell in love with books as a teenager while working at the local library. She studied journalism at UC Berkeley and screenwriting at Columbia before making her fiction debut with Mama, which one both the Doubleday New Voices in Fiction Award and the American Book Award.
"Too many of us are hung up on
what we don't have, can't have, or won't ever have. We spend too much energy being down,
when we could use that same energy -- if not less of it -- doing, or at least trying to
do, some of the things we really want to do."
--Terry McMillan
Terry reads from her latest novel (Getting to Happ) when it was a work in progress.
Recorded at the National Book Club Conference, Atlanta, GA (Aug 1, 2008)
Getting
to Happy
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Hardcover: 400
pages
Publisher: Viking Adult (September 7, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0670022047
ISBN-13: 978-0670022045
An exuberant return to the four unforgettable
heroines of Waiting to Exhale--the novel that changed African
American fiction forever.
Terry McMillan's Waiting to Exhale was more than just a
bestselling novel-its publication was a watershed moment in
literary history. McMillan's sassy and vibrant story about four
African American women struggling to find love and their place
in the world touched a cultural nerve, inspired a blockbuster
film, and generated a devoted audience.
Now, McMillan revisits Savannah, Gloria, Bernadine, and Robin
fifteen years later. Each is at her own midlife crossroads:
Savannah has awakened to the fact that she's made too many
concessions in her marriage, and decides to face life single
again-at fifty-one. Bernadine has watched her megadivorce
settlement dwindle, been swindled by her husband number two, and
conned herself into thinking that a few pills will help distract
her from her pain. Robin has an all-American case of
shopaholism, while the big dream of her life-to wear a wedding
dress- has gone unrealized. And for years, Gloria has taken
happiness and security for granted. But being at the wrong place
at the wrong time can change everything. All four are learning
to heal past hurts and to reclaim their joy and their dreams;
but they return to us full of spirit, sass, and faith in one
another. They've exhaled: now they are learning to breathe.
Terry McMillan received her B.A. in Journalism from the University of California at Berkeley, and attended the MFA Film Program at Columbia University. Macmillan's first novel, Mama, published in 1987, received a National Book Award by the Before Columbus Foundation. She has been awarded a 1988 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in literature, a 1986 New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, and the Doubleday/Columbia University Literary Fellowship. She was a three-time fellow at Yaddo Artist Colony and The MacDowell Colony. She has been a Visiting Professor of English at the University of Wyoming and Stanford University and an Associate Professor of English at the University of Arizona in Tucson.
It's OK if You're Clueless: and 23 More Tips for
the College Bound
Hardcover: 64 pages
Publisher: Viking Adult (April 25, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0670032980
From bestselling author Terry McMillan, life wisdom for high school graduates and those who love them
When her son Solomon graduated from high school, Terry McMillan was asked to be the guest speaker at the commencement ceremony. Determined not to be dull or redundant, Terry thought back to when she was stepping out into the world for the first time and the things she wished people had told her. Printing up what she thought were the most important tips for these new graduates, Terry was surprised to find that not only were these homemade pamphlets a hit with the students, but their parents clamored for copies too.
Now with It's Ok If you're Clueless, Terry McMillan brings her trademark wit and sass to every son and daughter about to take their first tentative steps into adulthood. Offering such nuggets as 'Sit up straight,' 'Don't listen to your parents,' and 'Bring your laundry home,' as well as 'See the world' and 'Read anything and everything,' It's Ok If you're Clueless is packed with the commonsense advice and conversational tone that have made her novels classic bestsellers. Equal parts witty and wise, It's Ok If you're Clueless is the perfect gift for the college bound this May.
The Interruption of
Everything
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ISBN: 0670031445
Format: Hardcover, 384pp
Pub. Date: July 19, 2005
Publisher: Viking Adult
Since Terry McMillan's breakout novel Waiting To Exhale surged onto the bestseller lists, critics and readers alike have been captivated by her irreverent, often-hilarious take on the issues faced by contemporary women. With The Interruption of Everything she picks up, pitch-perfect, the dilemmas of midlife: an empty nest. Hormones gone wild. Too many irrelevant demands and too little room to breathe.
Marilyn Grimes is about ready to jump out of her skin. She's the consummate wife and mother of three grown kids. She's got a no-great-shakes-but-a-good-provider of a husband, Leon; and a live-in mother-in-law, Arthurine, who comes with a bingo-playing beau, Prezell, and an elderly pooch, Snuffy. Marilyn's two best friends, Paulette and Bunny, are the quintessential take-no-prisoners, vintage McMillan girlfriends who will be there when Marilyn jumps, but . . . she's just not sure exactly where that will be . . . or when. First, she needs to remember what she used to love and call back some of her own postponed dreams. But just as Marilyn's plans for making changes are taking shape, life comes up with a few twists of its own. Suddenly Marilyn must reinvent just about everything: marriage, friendship, family-and not least of all, herself.
The Interruption of Everything is a triumphant testament to the fact that the detour is the path, and living life "by the numbers" never quite adds up.
A Day Late and a Dollar Short
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Format: Hardcover, 448pp.
ISBN: 0670896764
Publisher: Viking Penguin
Pub. Date: January 15th 2001
Much-heralded and long awaited, Terry McMillan's tour-de-force novel introduces the Price family-matriarch Viola, her sometimes-husband Cecil, and their four adult kids, each of whom sees life-and one another-through thick and thin, and entirely on their own terms. With her hallmark exuberance and cast of characters so sassy, resilient, and full of life that they breathe, dream, and shout right off the page, the author of the phenomenal best-sellers Waiting to Exhale and How Stella Got Her Groove Back has given us a novel that takes us ever-further into the hearts, minds, and souls of America-and gives us six more friends we never want to leave.
Read an AALBC Review of A Day Late and a Dollar Short written by Paige Turner
How
Stella Got Her Groove Back
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Amazon
Publisher: NAL/Dutton
Date Published: August 1998
Review from Lillian Lewis - BookList:
Stella Payne is a successful 42-year-old investment analyst and
divorced mother of an 11-year-old son, Quincy. But Stella has begun to feel that her life
needs some "groove." On the spur of the moment, she plans a trip to Jamaica to
relax and escape from her routine. She meets a man, half her age, whose honesty and
physical charm challenge her perceptions of what is acceptable and force her to rethink
and re-prioritize her image of herself and her life. Once she returns from her vacation,
she recognizes that her life has only been satisfying because it is what was expected from
a woman her age. Stella accomplishes her mission of doing something totally out of
character by taking her solo vacation "and" she succeeds at putting more than
just a "groove" back into her life. The stream-of-consciousness narration that
is utilized for most of this story is a bit awkward at times. McMillan's style here
differs markedly from that of "Waiting to Exhale", which brought her much
"girlfriend" popularity; yet she just may connect with an untapped readership.
Mama
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Publisher: Pocket Books
Date Published: December 1993
"McMillan's zesty first novel"
Review from Library Journal :
Mama , a first novel, tells of a proud black woman, Mildred Peacock, and her five
children. After a violent fight, Mildred throws her drunken husband out of the house. On
her own in the poor town of Point Haven, Michigan, Mildred scrimps and drinks, works and
goes on welfare, struggling to raise her kids and keep her sanity. Mildred's closest bond
is to her oldest daughter, Freda, and their lives parallel each other's progress from
despair to hope. The book's main weakness is that the author apparently could not decide
what to leave out. She also has not decided who her audience is: at times she seems to be
writing to blacks, at other times to be explaining things to naive white readers. Although
the story has power, it lacks focus and a clear point of view. Janet Boyarin Blundell,
MLS, Brookdale Community Coll. Adjunct Faculty, Lincroft, N.J.
Breaking
Ice: An Anthology of Contemporary Black Writers
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Amazon
Terry McMillan (Editor), John Edgar Wideman (Photographer)
ISBN: 0140116974
Format: Paperback, 683pp
Pub. Date: September 1990
Publisher: Penguin
A striking collection of works from authors both established and emerging, this is the first original anthology of African-American writing in over a decade. Featured contributors include: J. California Cooper, Marita Golden, Gloria Naylor, Darryl Pinckney, Ntozake Shange, Alice Walker, Ishmael Reed, Terry McMillan, and many others.
Waiting
to Exhale
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Publisher: Pocket Books
Date Published: September 1994
Review of Waiting to Exhale
Review from Library Journal :
Like McMillan's previous novels, Disappearing Acts ( LJ 7/89) and Mama ( LJ 1/87), her new
effort features a predictable plot, prose that often falls flat, and a narrative that
lacks depth. Four African American women living in Phoenix devote most of their energies
to searching for the one good black man who will make their dreams of the perfect partner
and lover come true. Unsurprisingly, Savannah, Bernie, Gloria, and Robin all kiss several
toads, but their trials and errors never arouse much interest. Far stronger is the
author's sharp, often humorous depiction of the strong bonds among the four friends, their
relationships with their families, and their community activities; readers will regret
that McMillan did not develop these areas further. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/92.--
Faye A. Chadwell, Univ. of South Carolina Lib., Columbia -Library
Journal
Disappearing
Acts
Click to order via Amazon
Publisher: Pocket Books
Date Published: August 1993
Chicken
Soup for the African American Soul: Celebrating and Sharing Our Culture, One
Story at a Timeby Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Lisa Nichols and Tom Joyner
Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: HCI (September 14, 2004)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0757301428
ISBN-13: 978-0757301421
Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
This is the book everyone has been waiting for-an inspiring celebration
of the joy, challenges, and triumphs of being African American.
Combine Iyanla Vanzant and
Terry McMillan, then include a dash of E. Lynn Harris,
and you've got Chicken Soup for the African American Soul. This book
captures the spirit of the community through inspiring storytelling that
understands both the struggles and joys of being African American. From Jim
Crow to the Civil Rights movement to today's business leaders and gangsta
culture, this book is a primer on black history. And like all Chicken Soup
books, it's a moving tribute to the small things-a moment of insight, a
mentor, a lover, the loss of innocence-that make life worth living. This
great volume is focused on representing all facets of African American
life-man and woman; young and old; rural, suburban, and urban; rich and
poor; race conscious and mostly color-blind.
Chapters Include: Celebrating Our Strength, Strong Roots, The African
American Family, Love and Relationships, The Power of Community, Praise,
Worship and Prayer
Featured Celebrities Include: Maya Angelou, Angela
Davis, E. Lynn Harris, Yolanda King (daughter of Martin
Luther King), Muhammad Ali, Mean Joe Green,
Bishop T.D. Jakes, Bill
Cosby, Colin Powell. Also look for Evelyn Palfrey's story, The Lady at the Bus Stop
Related Links
Terry on Twitter
http://twitter.com/#!/msterrymcmillan
Terry's Official Website
http://www.terrymcmillan.com/
Terry's Blog
http://www.comment-terry.blogspot.com/
Terry
McMillian is featured in the 2011 documentary film,
Behind Those Books, which is a thought
Provoking Documentary Tackling Societal Ills Through Literature
The film was Written & Produced by: Kaven Brown & Edited & Directed by:Mills Miller
Visit http://aalbc.it/behindthosebooks to learn more
