A review by engpunk77
Fortune's Bones: The Manumission Requiem by Marilyn Nelson

4.0

What a bizarre little book. What a bizarre subject. I loved it. I learned about a physician (bonesetter) who "dissected" his slave and hung his entire skeleton in a room in the house. The slave's poor wife had to dust his bones off because the plantation owner's wife (the wife of the doctor) was creeped out by it. You learn a fascinating but grim true story in prose juxtaposed with a poem's narrated from various perspectives: the slave wife, the doctor, the slave himself, etc. The poetry was in the format of a requiem, and it was beautifully done and morbidly fascinating.