Special thanks to the Pen/Faulkner Foundation Writers-in-Schools program and the students at District of Columbia high schools, especially Ballou, Coolidge, The Seed School, Chavez, Banneker, Bell, McKinley, and Anacostia. You are all exceptional. Go out and change the world.
Finally, I am humbled by the continued support of my little familia—David, Emilia, and Elena, who keeps asking me to write a book about her. Everything is about you, my darling.
About the Author
DOLEN PERKINS-VALDEZ is the author of the New York Times bestselling novel Wench. USA Today called the book “deeply moving” and “beautifully written.” People called it “a devastatingly beautiful account of a cruel past.” O, The Oprah Magazine chose it as a Top Ten Pick of the Month, and NPR named it a Top 5 Book Club Pick of 2010. Dolen’s fiction has appeared in The Kenyon Review, StoryQuarterly, StorySouth, and elsewhere. In 2011, she was a finalist for two NAACP Image Awards and the Hurston-Wright Legacy Award for fiction. She was also awarded the First Novelist Award by the Black Caucus of the American Library Association and has received a DC Commission on the Arts Grant. Dolen teaches in the Stonecoast MFA program. A graduate of Harvard and a former University of California President’s Postdoctoral Fellow at UCLA, Dolen lives in Washington, D.C., with her family.
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Also by Dolen Perkins-Valdez
Wench
Credits
Cover design by Robin Bilardello and Joanne O’Neill
Cover photographs: © Mooney Green Photography / Getty Images; © aleksandarvelasevic / Getty Images (swash)
Copyright
BALM. Copyright © 2015 by Dolen Perkins-Valdez. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Balm : a novel / Dolen Perkins-Valdez.—First edition.
pages ; cm
Summary: “Set during the Civil War era and exploring the next chapter of history-the end of slavery-this powerful story of love and healing is about three people who struggle to overcome the pain of the past and define their own future”— Provided by publisher.
ISBN 978-0-06-231865-7 (hardcover)—ISBN 978-0-06-231866-4 (softcover)—ISBN 978-0-06-231867-1 (ebook) 1. United States—History—Civil War, 1861-1865—Fiction. I. Title.
EPub Edition MAY 2015 ISBN 9780062318671
PS3616.E7484B35 2015
813'.6—dc23
2014043635
1516171819OV/RRD 10987654321
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