so-soDoris (a white woman) was minding her own business in her sleepy English cottage when she was kidnapped, shipped off and sold into slavery to serve Black people.
This book takes all the justifications for slavery and racism and by turning them onto white people along with a slice of satire and silliness, really shows how ridiculous (and arrogant) us whites are.
I liked this, but I'd hoped to love it.
pickAnother Grandin W 🤑 My interest in Herman Melville & admiration for Grandin dovetail in “The Empire of Necessity”, in which Grandin takes the real slave uprising that inspired Melville‘s “Benito Cereno” as a jumping off point for a grand history of slavery in the Americas, and especially Spanish America. Magisterial.
Visited a library book sale this week, and picked up a book that‘s been on my TBR list (tagged), and a favorite to put in a Little Free Library (The Days of Rondo).
pickWe all know the story about the slave trade, but what if it had been different? What if Africans had discovered the New World and forced Europeans into slavery? This is that story. Doris is playing hide and seek with her sisters when she‘s kidnapped and taking to this new country. All she can think about is returning to her family back in England.
#DoubleSpin July @TheAromaofBooks
#2008 #192025 @Librarybelle
Their feet were clad too, in objects called boots which were made of animal hide. They rode tightly up the leg to the knee, for some unfathomable reason.
Some, though, wore the foot objects called shoes, made of either animal hide or even stranger - wood. What crazed mind conjured up that idea?
so-soThis book started off really good, but dragged in the middle and the ending was just sort of meh. I think it‘s a fascinating concept and is a great example of what if and the general rule that all humans are evil.
In a world where Africa is the continent of advanced technology and the slave trade is reversed, follow the life of a slave girl from England.
2/5 stars parts are really well written and engaging, but a lot of the book is very slow.
pickHistorical fiction in verse, set in 1860 in the Asante kingdom (now Ghana), first in a trilogy. The main character is Kofi, an 11-year-old with an affinity for water & swimming. We get to know his daily life before he‘s captured by slavers. Author Kwame Alexander uses poetry & metaphor to distill ugly realities—shocking violence, rape, slavery—in a way that‘s manageable for middle grade readers. Excellent audio narration by Kobna Holbrook-Smith.
When I finished this book, I wondered about the target audience. The MC is 11 & difficult subjects are included (torture, revenge killing, rape, slavery). It‘s shelved in Children‘s at my library (the Teen section is roughly considered to be for age 12-17); the publisher Little Brown has it in their children‘s category, Kirkus says 10-18, Commonsense Media says 12+. And then I found this NPR article that conflates the two categories. 🤷♀️
pickWow! Another MG read that completely blew me away.
This book written in verse was heartbreaking, educational, thought provoking, and one of my best reads this year.
Kwame Alexander has written a book that addresses the slave trade in a way that young readers can understand; it's Roots for younger generations.
