Books › The Prince of Tides
The Prince of Tides
First published 1986 · 902 pages
A lush, emotionally devastating Southern epic that excavates the dark, tangled roots of family trauma to find a path toward healing.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like standing in the middle of a beautiful, terrifying thunderstorm. It is a sprawling, operatic experience that sweeps you into the humid, salt-scented air of the South Carolina low country and the sterile, glittering heights of New York City. The prose is famously lush and unapologetically grand, demanding that you feel every ounce of the characters' sorrow, rage, and fierce love. It moves at a steady, deliberate pace, peeling back layers of generational trauma and deeply buried secrets with a confessional intensity. This is a novel for readers who want to be emotionally devastated and then slowly put back together, offering a profound exploration of how the stories we tell about our past can either destroy us or set us free.
- Mood
- nostalgic
- tragic
- atmospheric
- turbulent
- Tone
- earnest
- lyrical
- passionate
- confessional
- Pace
- steady
- Themes
- generational trauma · the weight of memory · sibling bonds · healing through storytelling · Southern identity
- The writing
- Lush, operatic, and deeply descriptive, overflowing with Southern gothic lyricism and emotional grandeur.
- The arc
- Moves from deep repression and fractured trauma toward painful excavation, catharsis, and ultimately, a bittersweet acceptance.
- Who it's for
- Readers who love sprawling, emotionally devastating family sagas with rich, poetic prose and deep psychological excavation.
Content notes
- child abuse
- sexual assault
- suicide
- domestic violence
- severe trauma
About the book
PAT CONROY has created a huge, brash thunderstorm of a novel, stinging with honesty and resounding with drama. Spanning forty years, this is the story of turbulent Tom Wingo, his gifted and troubled twin sister Savannah, and their struggle to triumph over the dark and tragic legacy of the extraordinary family into which they were born.
Filled with the vanishing beauty of the South Carolina low country as well as the dusty glitter of New York City, The Prince of Tides is PAT CONROY at his very best.
Description from Open Library.
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