The Summer Country by Lauren Willig

The Summer Country by Lauren Willig-464 pages

A thoroughly enjoyable read.  Though it keeps you on your toes because it goes back and forth between two different times and a lot of characters.

1812 Colonial Barbados were slavery is in full swing. To 1854 Barbados where things have loosened up considerably.  Yet a few are still holding on to the past.  Love, lies and prejudices that last for generations.  There is a happy, surprise ending.  Enjoy!

Dark Age by Pierce Brown

Dark Age by Pierce Brown - 776 pages
Red Rising Series Book Five

It's been ten years since Darrow took his dead wife's dream to the stars and broke the world.   As an outlaw trying to rescue the doomed Free Legions on Mars he faces insurmountable odds and the temptation to give into the darkness in order to achieve victory.  He is challenged by those within the Republic and the resurrection of the lost last heir to the empire, Lysander who is back to claim what he feels is rightfully his.

The first of this book is battle, battle and more battle which gets a bit wearying.  But the plot kicks in and the characters who have been so strong throughout the series bring their voices to the story and then things picked up for me.  It's not the best entry in the series but I'm still curious to see what happens next. 

She Came to Slay: The Life and Times of Harriet Tubman by Erica Armstrong Dunbar

She Came to Slay: The Life and Times of Harriet Tubman by Erica Armstrong Dunbar-176 pages

I watched the film "Harriet" about Tubman recently and I wanted to know more and to know how much of the movie was based in truth and how much was artistic license.  In reading this biography, I am surprised that much of the movie is based on fact, although as per usual, there is some artistic license, especially in the details surrounding the facts. Harriet Tubman is a woman who survived and escaped slavery only to return to Maryland 13 times to retrieve other slaves (many were family members) and take them out of bondage. She risked being taken back into slavery herself, since she was a fugitive by law. She rescued some 70 slaves before the Civil War and hundreds more in the Cumbahee Raid in South Carolina during the Civil War. One thing I learned that surprised me is that Tubman supported, both in word and finances, John Brown. She wanted to see slavery end and knew that it would take bloodshed for it to happen. Additionally, she didn't receive a pension or pay for her work as a nurse for the Union during the Civil war until she was in her 70s and she never received pay for her work as a spy. Overall, I really enjoyed reading this accessible biography about an American hero and I would recommend it to anyone interested in American history or history in general.

Dread Nation by Justina Ireland

Dread Nation by Justina Ireland, 455 p.

"Jane McKeene was born two days before the dead began to walk the battlefields of Gettysburg and Chancellorsville—derailing the War Between the States and changing America forever. In this new nation, safety for all depends on the work of a few, and laws like the Native and Negro Reeducation Act require certain children attend combat schools to learn to put down the dead. But there are also opportunities—and Jane is studying to become an Attendant, trained in both weaponry and etiquette to protect the well-to-do. It’s a chance for a better life for Negro girls like Jane. After all, not even being the daughter of a wealthy white Southern woman could save her from society’s expectations.

But that’s not a life Jane wants. Almost finished with her education at Miss Preston’s School of Combat in Baltimore, Jane is set on returning to her Kentucky home and doesn’t pay much mind to the politics of the eastern cities, with their talk of returning America to the glory of its days before the dead rose. But when families around Baltimore County begin to go missing, Jane is caught in the middle of a conspiracy, one that finds her in a desperate fight for her life against some powerful enemies. And the restless dead, it would seem, are the least of her problems."

Great juxtaposition of zombies and the plight of the "colored folk." Many characters to love and many more to hate. Really looking forward to the next in the series. Listened to this on audio, and the narrator did a phenomenal job. 

Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery by Eric Metaxas

Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery by Eric Metaxas -- 304 pages

This is a biography of William Wilberforce, the man at the heart of the end of the British slave trade. Not only did Wilberforce help to end the slave trade, he also changed the hearts and minds of the British people, who before then never valued service to the poor or help for those less fortunate.
William Wilberforce has always been one of my heroes, and Eric Metaxas does a wonderful job portraying his life, his work, and his passion.

Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup

Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup -- 363 pages


Perhaps the best written of all the slave narratives, Twelve Years a Slave is a harrowing memoir about one of the darkest periods in American history. It recounts how Solomon Northup, born a free man in New York, was lured to Washington, D.C., in 1841 with the promise of fast money, then drugged and beaten and sold into slavery. He spent the next twelve years of his life in captivity on a Louisiana cotton plantation.

Ruth’s Journey: the Authorized Novel of Mammy from Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind

Ruth’s Journey: the Authorized Novel of Mammy from Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind

By Donald McCaig

374 pages

Any admirer of Gone with the Wind, will greatly enjoy this fictional account of Scarlett O’Hara Mammy Ruth’s life, which began in St. Domingue.  As a young adult, Ruth experiences love and loss along with some unexpected turns. The story leads to Scarlett O’Hara and her mischief as a child and teenager.   

The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass

The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass

By Frederick Douglass

752 pages

At the end of his biography, Frederick Douglass contributes his life as a reformer, orator, writer and abolitionist as partly due to luck, for he was introduced to influential abolitionist a few years after his escape from slavery. He was a modest man whose influence in the antislavery movement was center stage during the height of the conflict.  

His description of this life was written in 1881. However, Douglass had written two previous autobiographies. This work was more comprehensively, for it covered his escape from slavery and his life during the Civil War. Previously he would not write about his escape for it could cause himself and his family peril.

It is an excellent read and very inspiring. I would recommend it to anyone. 

Antebellum, by R. Kayeen Thomas

Antebellum, by R Kayeen Thomas, 480 pages

This is a story of a popular modern-day rapper who gets shot, and wakes up to find himself in antebellum America, where he is taken for a slave, brutalized, and eventually inspires a bloody revolt on the plantation and realizes how reprehensible his attitude was before he was shot.  Fans of urban fiction will probably like this. Those who bristle at speculative historical fiction probably won't.