River Sing Me Home: A GMA Book Club Pick
A GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK • This beautiful, page-turning and redemptive story of a mother’s gripping journey across the Caribbean to find her stolen children and piece her family back together is a “celebration of motherhood and female resilience” (The Observer).
Named One of Time’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2023 • A Dayton Literary Peace Prize Finalist
“A powerful novel that explores how freedom and family are truly defined”—Marie Benedict, New York Times bestselling coauthor of The Personal Librarian
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.
Named One of Time’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2023 • A Dayton Literary Peace Prize Finalist
“A powerful novel that explores how freedom and family are truly defined”—Marie Benedict, New York Times bestselling coauthor of The Personal Librarian
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.
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Community Reviews
I didn’t have a strong emotional reaction to the book, but there was still a lot to engage with. I was especially struck, again and again, by how complicated her depiction of “freedom” was. Shearer doesn’t settle for a tidy narrative of emancipation; instead, she repeatedly pulls at the threads, showing all the ways freedom was conditional, compromised, even challenging. Having left the plantation, Rachel still has the burdens of strenuous labor, inhuman power structures, etc—in addition to the new challenge of seeking her own employment. The contrasts between forced labor and chosen work are clear, but the analogues are also never far from view.
Those were the things that kept the book interesting, even when the narrative arc began to feel a little formulaic. The rolling journey from one child’s story to the next, to the next, etc—starts off strong, but settles into a rhythm that somewhat lost my interest. As for the writing itself, while there was nothing wrong with it, I rarely found much to connect with in it. I suppose I might not have minded a bit more intensity, or something.
Still, I do really respect the complexity and depth of Shearer’s depiction of the time & place. Post-emancipation life isn’t cast as a triumph so much as a formidable, ambiguous challenge. There were times when it reminded me a little of The Warmth of Other Suns—less in tone than in the sense of what freedom does and doesn’t guarantee. That’s good to be reminded of.
As a mom, this book brought me to tears. It’s one of my absolute favorites! I love how it beautifully captures the universal nature of a mother’s love; powerful, tender, and timeless.
This is the first book I read with my book club. I normally wouldn’t read this genre (historical fiction) but I really enjoyed it. I cried in sadness and joy. The storytelling was beautiful and I’m glad I got to experience this book
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