Lula Ann is such a deep black baby that her mother, Sweetness, is almost scared to death at her birth, and the father leaves the family because he cannot believe that this child is his. Sweetness raises Lula Ann to be obedient and submissive, out of fear of racist attacks. However, the growing daughter resists the imposed conformity. She changes her name to Bride, dresses in provocative white, builds a career at a cosmetics company, falls in love with a mysterious man, and thus frees herself from her past. The Nobel Prize winner writes about two strong women in a divided America. A novel that belongs to world literature.