Wench by Dolen Perkins-Valdez

January 8, 2011 by Christina

In her debut, Perkins-Valdez’s novel follows the lives of four slave women — Lizzie, Reenie, Sweet and Mawu — who are their masters’ mistresses, all of whom meet when their owners vacation at the same summer resort in Ohio. There, they see free blacks for the first time and hear rumors of abolition, sparking their own desires to be free. For everyone but Lizzie, that is, who cannot imagine leaving her children or her master. The book mostly takes place […]

Categories: 2011 Reads, Fiction, North America, United States • Tags: Dolen Perkins-Valdez