A mesmerizing page-turner-River Sing Me Home by Eleanor Shearer, a debut

About The Book

A Most Anticipated Book of 2023 by Real Simple, Goodreads, AARP, Boston.com, BookBub and BookRiot

Rare. Moving. Powerful. This beautiful, page-turning and redemptive story of a mother’s gripping journey across the Caribbean to find her stolen children in the aftermath of slavery is a remarkable debut.
 
Her search begins with an ending.…

The master of the Providence plantation in Barbados gathers his slaves and announces the king has decreed an end to slavery. As of the following day, the Emancipation Act of 1834 will come into effect. The cries of joy fall silent when he announces that they are no longer his slaves; they are now his apprentices. No one can leave. They must work for him for another six years. Freedom is just another name for the life they have always lived. So Rachel runs.
 
Away from Providence, she begins a desperate search to find her children—the five who survived birth and were sold. Are any of them still alive? Rachel has to know. The grueling, dangerous journey takes her from Barbados then, by river, deep into the forest of British Guiana and finally across the sea to Trinidad. She is driven on by the certainty that a mother cannot be truly free without knowing what has become of her children, even if the answer is more than she can bear. These are the stories of Mary Grace, Micah, Thomas Augustus, Cherry Jane and Mercy. But above all this is the story of Rachel and the extraordinary lengths to which a mother will go to find her children…and her freedom.

foot of an African child

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My Thoughts

Reading is knowledge. Reading is power and this is a very powerful book, one that makes you sit up and draws your attention. It has an important story in it. It’s about love. The ultimate love. A love story between a mother and her children. Her children that are no longer with her. Children she carried within her body for nine months and then they were stolen from her in the aftermath of slavery. Some stayed with her longer than others, none loved any less because of the time they stayed with her. The day after the King declares all slaves are free, the Emancipation Act of 1834 in Barbados goes into effect. We follow one woman’s journey to find her children as she and her companion’s trek across the Caribbean. A child’s pain becomes the mothers. Will she be able to find all of her children, or will she be caught by the slave catchers for a reward?
Memorable! Once you read this it will stay with you!

Pub Date 31 Jan 2023
I was given a complimentary copy of this book.
All opinions expressed are my own.

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