Friday, May 15, 2026 at 7:00 PM
Skylight Books, Los Angeles
 ****From the journalist and author of _Want Me_ (an NPR Best Book of the Year) comes a “tender, revelatory, and deeply moving” (Amanda Montei, _Touched Out_) story of family secrets, sisterhood, and the importance of untangling all that we inherit from our mothers.**** Tracy Clark-Flory had a sister out there, somewhere. She knew that her mom, Deb, was sent to a home for unwed mothers as a pregnant teenager in the Sixties. After placing her baby for adoption, Deb was committed to a mental institution in her grief. Decades later, she had Tracy, who grew up as an only child longing for her sister. Now, in her thirties and a mother herself, Tracy takes a DNA test in hopes of finding her sister—and she does. Newly connected with her half-sister Kathy, both daughters start asking questions about the past that their mom, who had died years earlier, could no longer answer. Tracy sets out to make sense of what happened back in 1965. She learns that their mom was pulled into a racist and sexist system designed to turn “bad girls” into proper women and wives. Tracy realizes that her own life has been profoundly shaped by her mom’s past, but she also uncovers a bigger story about patriarchal control, mother-daughter dynamics, and the way that shame keeps us divided—both within ourselves and from each other. Blending powerful memoir with cultural criticism, _My Mother’__s Daughter_ is a moving, intimate tale of traumatic inheritance and intergenerational healing. **Tracy Clark-Flory** is a journalist and author of _My Mother’s Daughter_ and _Want Me: A Sex Writer's Journey into the Heart of Desire_, which _New York Times_ bestselling author Rebecca Traister calls "intimate, challenging, and so very smart.” She has written for _Cosmopolitan_, _Elle_, _Esquire_, _Marie Claire_, Salon, The Guardian, Jezebel, _Wired_, _Women's Health_, and many others. **Koa Beck** is the author of the acclaimed nonfiction book [_White Feminism: From the Suffragettes to Influencers and Who They Leave Behind_](https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/White-Feminism/Koa-Beck/9781982134426), praised by feminist writers Gloria Steinem, Patrisse Khan-Cullors, Barbara Smith, and Rebecca Traister. She is a recipient of the Joan Shorenstein Fellowship at the Harvard Kennedy School and the Alan Jutzi Fellowship at The Huntington. She writes weekly at her newsletter, [Valley Girl,](https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/koabeck.substack.com/__;!!MbTiNj2pbBzljg!PKpS74_QW3BsoV5EWPk1le4jcpStjK-cvzj-TCQp7Af8n7P7wWrZZi-R7JbygmNHSOub7LqZGqtup86NUnHfa08EuTA$) an interrogation and cultural study of the “Valley Girl” stereotype across American culture, history, and lived experience. Koa lives in Los Angeles with her wife and daughter.