The Book Connect or Read These Books Together Pt. One

If you just read the synopses for these two books, Transcendent Kingdom and Godshot, they seem radically different.

Transcendent Kingdom features a young Black middle class woman who is trying to make peace with her family’s personal tragedy in the midst of a national opioid epidemic by pursuing scientific answers. On top of all this, she’s also learning new ways to exist with her grieving mother.

Godshot features a poor white little white girl being raised by a single mother in a religious sect who has to grow up too fast and figure out a way to question and then exist.

However, and perhaps it's because I read them relatively close together, I think they complement each other really nicely. Loosely inspired by the great Shea Serrano’s new podcast “The Connect”, I’m going to run down things these two books have in common:

• They are both coming-of-age stories that feature a daughter-mother duo;

• The mother in question is deeply involved with religion;

• The previously mentioned devout daughter has a crisis of faith prompting her to reevaluate her relationship to religion;

• The authors invite us to think about motherhood, agency, and community;

• The books’ settings are in rural places; and

• At some point the books also both take place in California.

If you’ve read these two books are there any other connections I’m missing?