Thursday 9 March 2023

#ThrowbackThursday. Cane River and Red River

Tademy, Lalita "Cane River" - 2001

I am a fan of American history and I am a fan of women's history. This book combines both. Lalita Tademy describes the different lives of four of her ancestors, the first one born into slavery, the last one born into "freedom", all of them having children with white men. I liked the way these women's lives were described with all the problems, African-Americans had during those times.

We discussed this in our international book club in March 2003.

Tademy, Lalita "Red River" - 2007

And here is the story of her father's ancestors, the Tademy family that came all the way from Egypt as free men only to be turned into slaves in the States. The story begins after the Civil War when the slaves have officially been freed but white supremacists don't want to accept that, so there is still a long struggle ahead of them.

Read my original reviews here and here.

4 comments:

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    1. Neither was I, Emma. I think it was an Oprah book, that's how we found it.

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  2. My book club read Red River a few years ago because one of our members was from the area. It was fascinating to have her take on the discussion -- part of which was that since she grew up white, she didn't learn this story until much later in life.

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    1. Thanks, Joy.
      We can't really blame your member for not knowing since everything was done to keep these kinds of stories a secret.
      But it must have been fascinating to listen to her, it's always great to discuss books with someone from the area or who knows the background. That was one of the great advantages of the international book club.

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