Terry McMillan, who gave voice to the angst of African-American women (and all women) in novels such as "Waiting to Exhale" and "How Stella Got Her Groove Back," is coming back soon with a new novel. “Getting to Happy,” will be released in the fall, and Essence magazine is running excerpts to help mark its 40th anniversary.

Pages from the new book -- a sequel to "Waiting to Exhale" -- will appear in the next four issues of Essence, starting with the June edition, which came out this week, the Associated Press reported. Essence noted that McMillan's ties to the magazine date back to the 1970s, when she was in college and won an Essence writing contest.

“They're like family, and Essence readers have been a large part of my audience,” McMillan (shown here in 2008) said, according to the AP.

Here's a video of McMillan reading from her new novel at Lenoir-Rhyne University's Visiting Writers Series.