Kim Mclarin is a novelist, former staff writer for the Philadelphia Inquirer, The Greensboro News & Record, The New York Times and the Associated Press. She is currently a writer in residence at Emerson College and contributes to, Basic Black, a well regarded weekly television show that explores African-American themes in Boston. Her books and writings explore the lives, relationships and the emotional lives of African-American women. The stories are honest, sometimes painful and always interesting. They invite the reader into a complex world of longing and struggle that speak to the real thoughts and feelings of women everywhere.
Kim Mclarin’s Novels
- Taming it Down–Hope Robinson is Black scholarship student at a predominantly white New Hampshire Prep school. She graduates from school to take a job at a prestigious Philadelphia newspaper where again she find herself being one of the few African-Americans to hold a professional position. Just as things, seem to be going well, an anonymous letter complaining blaming affirmative action for some of the problems the paper is experiencing. Hope find herself torn between two men; one white, who has girlfriend and one black who feels that Hope does not have enough empathy for the Black neighborhood she is assigned to cover.
- Meeting of the Waters–This novel exploring an interracial relationship and its aftermath takes place in the volatile time period after the Rodney King beating. Porter Stockman a white reported is beaten while in Los Angeles covering the Rodney King trial. Lenora Page, a black reporter happens to be on the scene during his beating and rescues him. A complicated romance ensures in which Lenora and Porter navigate the disapproval that their friends and family demonstrate regarding their relationship and the strain that society puts them through as well.
- Jump at the Sun–This ambitious and provocative novel centers around a subject that Mclarin has not previously covered; motherhood its many issues. Grace should by all accounts be happy. She is a professor at a university, her husband is successful and is devoted to her and she has two beautiful daughters. Yet at the opening of the book we find her desperately trying to get the morning after pill to end any hope of pregnancy after she has had unprotected sex with her husband. Grace is also struggling in the role of wife and mother and constantly contemplates abandoning her family.
Reviews of Kim Mclarin’s books
Inner turmoil, racial tension, love, family and history all play a significant role in Mclarin’s writing. In addition, her books has been described as courageous and provoking while at the same time creating an empathy and understanding of her character’s conflicts in a way that makes them very compelling and also very real.
Why Kim Writes & What Inspires her
In an interview with Deesha Philysaw, of Literary Mama, Kim states that she writes because, “She has to and because she cannot imagine not doing so. “ She goes on to explain that her life experiences shaped and inspired her writing. She grew up in the South after the Civil Rights Movement and was poor as a child; these things shaped her world view in a way that makes her tells stories from that vantage point.
Philyaw Deesha, Interview with Kim Mclarin, Literary Mama
McLarin, Kim. Taming it Down–Warner Books, p1999
Meeting of the Waters–Thorndike Press, p2002
Jump at the sun–W.Morrow, p2006
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