Kin by Tayari Jones is a novel about two women, Vernice and Annie, who grew up as “cradle friends” in a small town in Louisiana in the 1950s. Both are motherless (Vernice’s mother was killed by her father, Annie’s mother abandoned her as an infant), and as they grow up, they become each other’s sister. After high school, Vernice goes to college while Annie moves to Memphis in search of her mother. Kin follows their parallel lives as they move into adulthood, always a presence for each other despite the physical distance between them. Through the women’s sporadic letters and alternating chapters, Jones tracks Annie and Vernice’s two very different trajectories, ultimately showing that the strength of their friendship, borne from almost identical circumstances, is not enough to even out their adulthoods. While I enjoyed this book, for me it didn’t pack the emotional wallop of An American Marriage, a book I still think about often, 8 years after I read it. I’d still recommend Kin, though – it’s a compelling and at times heartbreaking look at the Jim Crow South through two very different lenses.