Book Proposal: Echoes in the Silence
Overview
Echoes in the Silence is a lyrical memoir that explores the hidden legacies and entanglements of family, race, class, and exile, told through the intimate lens of a daughter searching for belonging and truth.
In the wake of her mother’s death, photographer and writer Kate Sterlin finally uncovers the decades-old secret her mother refused to acknowledge: the existence of her father’s son from a another relationship—her half-brother.
Her brother was born in California in the early 1970s. Both his mother and Sterlin’s mother—actresses in her father’s theater company—were pregnant at the same time. After the couple left California for England, her mother’s homeland, the boy was born—and never spoken of again.
Sterlin’s father had already been exiled as a baby from Haiti in the 1950s, when his own father—Sterlin’s grandfather—fled the country, leaving behind a son from a relationship he could not publicly claim due to class and color. Nearly forty years later, Sterlin met that son’s daughter—her cousin. And nearly a decade after that, through a DNA match on 23andMe, she would finally find the brother she had spent a lifetime imagining.
In her own life, Sterlin faced a mirrored version of this generational pattern: not long after the birth of her daughter with her husband, Sterlin learned he had fathered a child during the early, undefined stages of their relationship. The girl, raised by white parents and estranged from her biological roots, entered their lives at eighteen. In witnessing this reunion, Sterlin was forced to confront her own inheritance: the repetition of secrecy, erasure, and eventual reckoning. And the cost of keeping—or revealing—these truths to her own children.
Echoes in the Silence traces this complex family history and explores how deeply the need for truth reverberates across generations. It is a meditation on identity, migration, withheld stories, and the search for meaning. Spanning New York, Haiti, California, and London, the book braids personal narrative with cultural history and interrogates the ethics of truth-telling when we, too, are keepers of our own secrets.
Structure & Style
Rather than a linear retelling, the book unfolds through standalone narrative episodes—each a story in itself—that together form a portrait of a family shaped by what was hidden, and what was found. As with Still Life: Photographs & Love Stories, Sterlin’s debut, each chapter is crafted to stand alone both visually and narratively. But as in the work of Jhumpa Lahiri, these stories resonate collectively, gradually revealing a deep emotional and thematic coherence. The result is a memoir that moves like memory itself: fragmented, recursive, and cumulative—inviting the reader into a nonlinear but fully realized journey through silence, discovery, and belonging.
The storytelling will be intimate, spare, and emotionally layered—anchored in personal voice while evoking broader questions of inheritance and identity. While visual materials may accompany the narrative, they will not drive it; the strength of the book lies in the clarity and resonance of its voice, not in archival documentation.
Format & Market Position
Echoes in the Silence will appeal to readers of contemporary memoir, particularly those drawn to themes of family secrets, racial identity, diasporic belonging, and intergenerational reconciliation. Stylistically and thematically, it will resonate with fans of Saidiya Hartman, Dani Shapiro, Kiese Laymon, Edwidge Danticat, Claudia Rankine, Maggie Nelson, and Cheryl Strayed.
The book will feature an unconventional structure and narrative intimacy, with a tone that bridges poetic memoir and documentary storytelling. It invites the reader into a layered emotional experience that unfolds piece by piece, much like memory or family myth.
Proposed Length
Approximately 65,000 words.
Current Status
The manuscript is currently in development. While no chapters are yet complete, the author has created a detailed outline and is actively assembling narrative material. Visual elements such as photographs or ephemera may be included selectively to support the text. The author is seeking representation and/or a publishing partner to bring the project to full realization.
Comparable Titles
Inheritance by Dani Shapiro
Heavy by Kiese Laymon
Brother, I'm Dying by Edwidge Danticat
The Fact of a Body by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich
Citizen by Claudia Rankine
The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson
