the book of negroes. lawrence hill

There are some books you don't feel qualified to review. Here am I, a middle aged, Australian woman who, although I have faced gender discrimination in my life, have never remotely dealt with anything like the challenges faced by our heroine, Animata Diallo. Yet, I felt strongly connected to her. Her love of language, her dignity, her spirit and love of family - all these things I can relate to. To me, she was a strangely modern character, well ahead of her time, strong, outspoken, reflective but not once during the book did I feel that Lawrence Hill portrayed her unrealistically. On a side note, I find that the fact that Hill penned his protagonist as female is interesting in itself - he certainly "captures" the female psyche well! Lawrence Hill has done his homework and, in doing so, has educated and enlightened me. I had little knowledge of the African Slave trade. Sure, I knew that people were captured from different language groups, bound together and shipped to wherever they would fetch the highest price whilst facing unspeakable cruelties and indignities, but that was about it. I didn't know anything about daily life on the plantations, the Book of Negroes, the shipment of Loyalists to Nova Scotia and other destinations, the establishment of Sierra Leone. I had seen Slaves as wretched people and, undoubtedly they were but I hadn't realised the extent to which they were able to form communities, comfort and nurture each other and tenuously keep in touch with others through the underground "fishnet" system. To say that they often triumphed over adversity would be an understatement. Yet, their losses and the humiliations inflicted on them were mind numbing. On considering what Animata lost, gained back, lost again, all the while enduring uninagineable hardship, it was difficult to see her surviving and yet she did - magnificently so. At the risk of spoiling other readers' enjoyment of her story, I will only say that her survival is only one of the uplifting events in this book of sorrows. The writing is spectacular but never inaccessible. Lawrence Hill tells this epic tale simply. Written in the first person and in a narrative style (both styles I usually steer clear of), it is never dry or dull and doesn't intimidate the reader. And his writing is poetic. How could you not cry when you read something like "Englishmen do love to bury one thing so completely in another that the two can only be separated by force: peanuts in candy, indigo in glass, Africans in irons"? I did have a couple of minor issues with the ending of the story - it was a bit "neat" for me and felt a bit rushed (as if Hill had a publishing deadline to meet or something) but those issues didn't diminish my overall reading experience one little bit! In summary, to those readers who long to read something of substance, READ THIS BOOK. You will learn so much about the lives of the slaves ripped from their homelands and those born into slavery. You will also be uplifted by the resilience of the human spirit and what it's capable of accomplishing. But you won't just learn - you will also get to read a well researched, well written, rollicking good book! And those are few and far between!

This is undoubtedly a great book that will stay with me for a long time. Aminata Diallo is a powerful character—a woman who endured immense hardship yet emerged with a small but meaningful victory. While slavery is widely known, it’s rare to truly consider the experiences of the enslaved and the profound challenges they faced adapting to a new culture, separated from family and homeland. Lawrence Hill’s work on this book is exceptional, offering a deeply moving and insightful narrative.

This is a book that personalises the horrific history of the slave trade through the eyes of an inspirational, driven and larger than life character. I found myself being educated on the origins of the slave trade - I never knew that it began with Africans enslaving other Africans - and the role of the US and the UK in the horrors that followed. It's hard in 2011 to believe that so many people were treated worse than animals but this novel brings this to life in a wonderfully readable and descriptive manner. The Book of Negroes doesn't preach but it's remarkably easy to become enraged at what these people had to endure in order to make money for others. But it is all told by way of one woman's story making the whole thing easy to follow and allows one to unravel the complicated history of slavery by means of a touching and vivid narrative. While the protagonist is one of fiction all the events are unfortunately real. I learned so much about Africa, the US, Canada and ultimately the amazing story of the foundation of the capital of Sierra Leon, Freetown. All in all, a page turning, riveting and touching story. I found myself in a former slave fort on the coast of Ghana shortly after reading this book and found that experience all the more moving after reading The Book of Negroes. It's so difficult in modern times to try to comprehend the lives of those who have gone before us - this novel succeeds enormously in bringing the tragic experiences of the African people to a level that you can begin to start to attempt to comprehend. A beautiful, touching gem of a book.

Someone Knows My Name is an excellent piece of historical fiction writing. Aminata Diallo is abducted from her West African home at age 11, and brutally marched for months to the coast where she is sold by slave traders. Barely surviving the horrific ocean crossing, she is delivered to the Carolina Coast to work the indigo plantations. Her adventures and hardships, as she travels the eastern coast of the Americas and Canada, back to Africa and ultimately to England, are mesmerizing. It is always a surprise to me when a male author creates such a believable, authentic, unique and memorable female character, and Lawrence Hill has done exactly that in this riveting book. Meticulously researched, steeped in history and harsh reality, Someone Knows My Name entertains, educates and resonates. After finishing the book in a weekend marathon of reading, I scoured the internet for more details and facts surrounding this facet of slavery I knew little, if anything, about. British relocation of American slaves to Novia Scotia at the end of the Revolution, and their subsequent resettlement with other former slaves in Freetown, Sierra Leone was both fascinating and sobering. Observed through the intelligent eyes of Aminata, the irony of the American patriots' fight against British oppression is painful. Aminata carries herself with dignity, strength and pride through repeated and shameful acts of inhumanity, living to tell her story in her own words, on her own terms. This book is beautifully written, heart wrenching and deeply moving, and I recommend it highly.

Enjoying the books!

Excellent book. Well written. The story of a African gal taken from her country and family and sold into slavery. It is her life's journey. She was very bright, with exceptional intelligence, much more so than all of her "owners". This is a story that needs to be told, as the type of thinking that is exemplified in this book is still very much a part of many regions of this great country. It is a story of how men without morals or beliefs in equality take and take and take from people over which they have total power. Yet these owners pretend to be up-standing members of the human race living in a society in which a powerful few exercise life and death decisions over people far better, far more intelligent and with higher morals than their owners. It show how a society can become totally bankrupt and become a sicking part of the human race. Yet the tail, as told by such a wonderful positive person, looks at the joy of life and perseveres the destructive aspects of the old south. it is a heartwarming tail in may respects. It is something that every person should know so that the cause of such despicable behavior can be eradicated from the soles of the population.

Excellent book, I love books where the narrator is a character as well. This was my second read for black history month. And I loved it.

What a great book. I think we have come a long way since the times of the early 1800s but unfortunately still have a long way to go till everybody respects other people who are different, in color, beliefs or sexual orientation. I cant image being on that ship tied up, with limited space for movement and barely being kept alive for the months that it took to cross the ocean. This is a very good book, although fiction, the story was based on many true facts. I got the same feeling reading this book that I did when I read "Twelve years a slave" I sincerely hope they make a movie based on The Book of Negroes, I would certainly go and see it. I highly recommend reading this book, and hopefully those who are still prejudice against coloured people may change their attitude.