This was the book pick for book club this month. I don't think I would have had it on my radar otherwise so thank you Kate.
We can all agree slavery was an awful part of US history. This story takes us inside life at a plantation through the story of Lavinia. She is a young Irish girl whose parents die on the ship over and so she ends up living on a plantation in Virginia.
Lavinia lives in the kitchen house with Belle. Belle is the daughter of the plantation owner but since her mother was a slave she is too. There is also Mama, Papa, Uncle Jacob, Ben, and twins Beattie and Fanny. They take in Lavinia as one of their own.
While there is hardship, cruelty, pain for the people who are the property of the Captain, there is also much love.
Lavinia is told that family is more than blood ties but it is over a number of years that she learns the true meaning of that statement.
A powerful story and a great book despite the ugliness it contains.
(Finished January 17, 2015)
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