The Waterbearers: A Memoir of Mothers and Daughters

In this piercing and poetic debut memoir, cultural critic Bonét traces three generations of Black women in her family. Beginning with her grandmother, Betty Jean Davis—the great-granddaughter of slaves and a tenant farmer in mid-century Louisiana who bore 11 children by nine men—Bonét maps the ensuing legacy of trauma and survival that shaped her own upbringing. Bonét’s mother, Connie, had a chaotic childhood in Houston, Tex., characterized by poverty and Betty Jean’s flinty emotional distance. “Everything that brought me discomfort as a child was met with narratives about my mother surviving on next to nothing,” Bonét recalls. The memories she shares of Connie’s scarcity and her confusion about “all the ways a mother and daughter can be so different” echo Connie’s own feelings about Betty Jean. Clear-eyed but never cynical, Bonét approaches these cycles of difficulty and disappointment with curiosity, crafting an ode to “all the Black women whose backs have been bent into bridges so that [Americans] can be raised.” The result is a beautiful testament to generational resilience and a forceful reckoning with the legacy of American racism. Agent: Alice Whitwham, Cheney Agency. (Sept.)