Kathryn Stockett The Calamity Club

《The Calamity Club》是凯瑟琳·斯托凯特继2009年（The Help）之后，时隔十七年推出的第二部长篇小说，甫一上市便登顶《纽约时报》畅销书榜，Goodreads评分高达4.61/5，亚马逊有声书榜也长期稳居前列。

这本书最吸引人的地方，不是“女性互助”这个标签，而是它把互助写得很危险、很具体、很带劲。十一岁的梅格被母亲遗弃在孤儿院，等着一个可能永远不会回来的承诺；二十四岁的伯蒂为了保住家族老宅，硬着头皮向嫁入名门的妹妹求助，却发现所谓体面生活早已千疮百孔；而查理的出现，让三个走投无路的人决定联手做一门“不能见光的生意”。

斯托凯特很会写南方：潮湿、闲话、阶级、宗教式的伪善，以及女人在夹缝里长出来的聪明。她写梅格那种“明明心碎了还要装作不在乎”的倔强，写伯蒂从规矩簿记员变成反叛者的转变，都很有力量。沉重题材没有被处理成苦情戏，反而充满辛辣幽默和爽感。


书名：The Calamity Club

作者：Kathryn Stockett

简介：The multi-million copy selling author of The Help returns with a bold, big-hearted novel about a group of unbreakable women, fighting for what’s rightfully theirs—and the power of friendship to change everything.

In 1933 Oxford, Mississippi, Prohibition is on the wane, and the Great Depression is tightening its grip. Poor and rich folks alike have fallen on hard times, even as the old social order remains. For women on the margins, the options are few and the price of dignity and self-determination is unbearably high.

Eleven-year-old Meg, one of the unadoptable “big girls” at the Lafayette County Orphan Asylum, fights each day to keep her spirit unbowed. Birdie, unmarried and outspoken, has come to Oxford on a mission to ask her social-climbing sister to help the struggling family she’s left behind. And Charlie is a woman with a past, running low on luck but driven by fire, fury, and grit. When their fates converge, they come up with an audacious plan to take back control of their lives. Together, they form an unlikely sisterhood—but in a place and time where hypocrisy is rife, women’s freedom is fragile, and making an enemy can have dire consequences, will the price they pay for their outrageous risk-taking be too high?

The Calamity Club will make you laugh, cry, and cheer—an epic testament to resilience, friendship, and the fierce, funny women who know that calamity can be the spark of new beginnings.