This post contains affiliate links which means if you click on a link and choose to make a purchase I may receive a commission at no additional cost to you. See our disclaimer for more information.
The Publisher’s Summary:
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK
The unique and deeply moving saga of four generations of African-American women whose journey from slavery to freedom begins on a Creole plantation in Louisiana.
Beginning with her great-great-great-great grandmother, a slave owned by a Creole family, Lalita Tademy chronicles four generations of strong, determined black women as they battle injustice to unite their family and forge success on their own terms. They are women whose lives begin in slavery, who weather the Civil War, and who grapple with contradictions of emancipation, Jim Crow, and the pre-Civil Rights South. As she peels back layers of racial and cultural attitudes, Tademy paints a remarkable picture of rural Louisiana and the resilient spirit of one unforgettable family.
There is Elisabeth, who bears both a proud legacy and the yoke of bondage… her youngest daughter, Suzette, who is the first to discover the promise-and heartbreak-of freedom… Suzette’s strong-willed daughter Philomene, who uses a determination born of tragedy to reunite her family and gain unheard-of economic independence… and Emily, Philomene’s spirited daughter, who fights to secure her children’s just due and preserve their dignity and future.
Meticulously researched and beautifully written, Cane River presents a slice of American history never before seen in such piercing and personal detail.
Cane River is available on Amazon, at your library and, hopefully, at your favorite brick and mortar book shop.
Novel Activities to Pair with Cane River
Readers of Cane River would enjoy a visit to The Colored Girls Museum. This museum, the first of its kind, serves as a clearinghouse of multidimensional arty-facts, objects and information about Colored Girls: equal parts research facility, exhibition space, gathering place and think tank. The Colored Girls Museum is a memoir museum, which honors the stories, experiences, and history of ordinary Colored Girls. This museum initiates the object—submitted by the colored girl herself, as representative of an aspect of her story and personal history, which she finds meaningful; her object embodies her experience and expression of being a Colored Girl. The Colored Girls Museum is headquartered in the historic, primarily black, neighborhood of Germantown in Philadelphia, an area renowned for its compliment of historic buildings and homes and many murals depicting the lives of it residents.
———
If you love pairing reading with novel activities that keep life interesting, be sure to subscribe to The Novel Tourist newsletter to stay up-to-date with all of the novel activities and literary-travel pairings and suggestions. After all, Life Should be as Fun as Fiction!