River Sing Me Home by Eleanor Shaerer (audiobook)

 genre: historical fiction

When the plantation owner on Barbados where Rachel is enslaved announces that Great Britain has legally ended the practice of slavery, it’s hard for her to feel anything but hollow. Not just because she immediately learns that she is now an “unpaid indentured servant” for the next six years, but mostly because she is a mother without her children near her. The practice of slavery ripped child after child away from Rachel and after the promise of freedom is taken away, Rachel takes matters into her own hands. She decides that she is going to find her sons and daughters, whatever it takes.

This is a story of a Caribbean shackled by slavery and colonialism. It is about the fierce love of a mama for her children, no matter how old they are or how long they’ve been away. It’s about the strength of women and the bonds of love we can create with people and places. Rachel’s traumatic past doesn’t stop her from searching for what she wants, even when it doesn’t always go how she’d planned or wanted. There is a LOT of heartbreak in this story, there is violence and pain and I felt my heart actually race with fear at one point, my desire for Rachel to be successful was so strong. The dialect that is spoken in this story might make it hard for some readers to appreciate the story but for myself as a listener, it helped me to feel more grounded in the Caribbean of the early 19th century. While I didn’t find myself overly amazed by the prose, I was quickly and deeply pulled into the story, I invested in Rachel and her children and those she gathered to herself along her journey. I’m grateful I listened to this one, it fleshed out a history I needed to be more aware of.