Elena Nicolaou is a senior entertainment editor at TODAY.com, where she covers the latest in TV, pop culture, movies and all things streaming. Her superpower is matching people up with the perfect book. Previously, she covered culture at Refinery29 and Oprah Daily.
Jenna Bush Hager says she's been a fan of Oyinkan Braithwaite since reading her debut novel, 'My Sister the Serial Killer.' 'Her mix of both humor and wisdom with such a fresh new perspective,' she tells TODAY.
com. Which is what made her especially excited to read — and ultimately pick — Braithwaite's followup 'Cursed Daughters' for her Read With Jenna book club. 'I was delighted by this book,' she says. 'Cursed Daughters' follows 'family of women in Lagos who believe they are not destined to love' due to a generational curse, Jenna says. 'This is a book about family, sisterhood and what it means to fall in love,' Jenna says, teasing 'a few epic love stories at the center.' 'It is very funny at moments and extremely poignant at others. It'll have you getting a pen out to underline as I did. I think you will love this book and I hope you will share it with your daughters, your sisters, your mothers,' she continues. Speaking to TODAY, Braithwaite says she wanted to write something completely different from her bestselling debut 'My Sister the Serial Killer' for her second novel. 'I had a need to challenge myself to see what I can do. I definitely didn't want to be like, 'What does 'My Sister the Serial Killer' part 2 look like?'' she says. 'I don't think I would have been fulfilled.' Braithwaite says her books always start with a concept that intrigues her. In the case of 'Cursed Daughters,' what she was drawn to was the idea of reincarnation. One character in the book is believed to be the reincarnation of her aunt, who died just as she was being born. While Braithwaite was figuring out the family's backstory, she landed on the idea of a generational curse that says no woman will be able to 'hold onto a man.' 'This novel is basically about all the women who have to contend with this curse and this legacy, and the three youngest women of this family and how they deal with it,' she continues. Ebun and Monife are first cousins who go about dealing with the curse differently: Ebun runs from romance and Monife goes headfirst into it. Ebun's first-born, Eniiyi, lives in the shadow of all that went wrong for her aunt Monife. The book also goes back many generations in the family to see how the curse presented itself — 'if it was a curse' at all, Braithwaite says. She says readers have to look forward to a bit of romance, in addition to all the deep family ties. 'I hope people ship some of the couples. Fingers crossed,' she says.
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