Winner of the 2019 Women’s Prize for Fiction

Could you put your life on hold for twelve years? A stunning love story about family, injustice and marriage, and three people at once bound and separated by forces beyond their control.

Newlyweds, Celestial and Roy, are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. They are settling into the routine of their life together, when they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to twelve years for a crime Celestial knows he didn’t commit.

Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison passes, she is unable to hold on to the love that has been her center. After five years, Roy’s conviction is suddenly overturned, and he returns to Atlanta ready to resume their life together.

An American Marriage is a masterpiece of storytelling, an intimate look into the souls of people who must reckon with the past while moving forward - with hope and pain - into the future.