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A review by quiettalker
River Sing Me Home by Eleanor Shearer
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Rachel has spent her life in enslavement on a sugar plantation in Barbados. Though she has given birth to many children, they have all been taken away from her. Rachel lost babies to stillbirth and disease, but the five who grew into childhood were taken from her and sold to other plantations.
Although emancipation comes at the start of the book, it brings no real freedom because of the "apprenticeships" which bind all enslaved people to their enslavers for another 6 years. Faced with this reality, Rachel decides to run and soon finds herself on a journey to find freedom, which for her means collecting the stories of her stolen children.
Rachel's journey takes her from Bridgetown, to British Guiana, to Trinidad, and although it's not an "adventure story", it often felt like it followed a heroes journey arch. The result is a touching, informative, and introspective adventure about a middle-aged women taking back self-determination. Rachel and her children's experiences overlap with Indigenous Caribbean characters in a way that I found to be beautiful and informative.
There are two author's notes which really help show the research that went into the time, setting and characters, as well as the choices around language. I love this vein of historical fiction, and though I have read a lot of great books that take place on American plantations and tell the shared history of white and black Americans (A Sitting in St. James, The Sweetness of Water) this is the first I've read set in the Caribbean and it really deepened my understanding of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and emancipation.
Thank you to Penguin Random House for the ARC.
Although emancipation comes at the start of the book, it brings no real freedom because of the "apprenticeships" which bind all enslaved people to their enslavers for another 6 years. Faced with this reality, Rachel decides to run and soon finds herself on a journey to find freedom, which for her means collecting the stories of her stolen children.
Rachel's journey takes her from Bridgetown, to British Guiana, to Trinidad, and although it's not an "adventure story", it often felt like it followed a heroes journey arch. The result is a touching, informative, and introspective adventure about a middle-aged women taking back self-determination. Rachel and her children's experiences overlap with Indigenous Caribbean characters in a way that I found to be beautiful and informative.
There are two author's notes which really help show the research that went into the time, setting and characters, as well as the choices around language. I love this vein of historical fiction, and though I have read a lot of great books that take place on American plantations and tell the shared history of white and black Americans (A Sitting in St. James, The Sweetness of Water) this is the first I've read set in the Caribbean and it really deepened my understanding of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and emancipation.
Thank you to Penguin Random House for the ARC.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Violence and Abandonment
Minor: Child abuse and Miscarriage