SONG YET SUNG by James McBride

This book is so not your typical slavery novel; it’s much more nuanced, leaving the brutal beatings and separation of families to other writers.  In fact, it’s mostly an adventure story, where the villains are not the punishing landowners but are instead the folks who tracked down escapees and stole slaves so that they could sell them elsewhere.  The most despicable of these slave traders is Patty Cannon, who makes the mistake of imprisoning Liz Spocott, who has mystical powers and becomes known as the Dreamer.  She escapes from Patty’s imprisonment and frees a dozen or so other slaves in the process.  The action all takes place in Eastern Maryland, where oyster beds provide a living for most of the denizens, but Kathleen Sullivan has a farm and three slaves—a man named Amber, his sister, and her 17-year-old son.  All sorts of shenanigans ensue, including the kidnapping of a white child and encounters with the Woolman, a Black man who viewers describe as a ghost or the devil, because of his unkempt appearance and swiftness of movement.  The most ambivalent character is Denwood Long, who has come out of retirement to trace down the Dreamer.  He wants the money that her master will pay, but Denwood also recognizes the injustice of slavery, so that sometimes his humanity interferes with his job.  The only time that this book drags is when the author gets bogged down (pun intended) in a description of the swampy landscape.  Otherwise, the novel moves along at a good clip, with excellent character development, particularly of Amber, who is torn between helping his nephew escape to Pennsylvania, less than 90 miles away and staying on the farm to help Kathleen stay solvent.  Having no wife and children of his own, Amber has become attached to Kathleen’s eight-year-old son, whose father disappeared in a squall.  I particularly liked Kathleen, a strong, no-nonsense woman, who is also conflicted.  She could sell Amber in order to pay off her debts, but in addition to losing his help on the farm, she will not be able to guarantee that his subsequent owner will be as fair-minded as she is.