The Wedding Gift

The Wedding Gift

by Marlen Suyapa Bodden

Genre: Historical Fiction

Synopsis:  Despite their disparate circumstances, the lives of these two women in 1852 Alabama are inextricably entwined: Sarah, a slave who is the daughter of the master of a vast plantation, and Theodora, his wife.  Their journey is one that both binds them together and sets them free.

When prestigious plantation owner Cornelius Allen gives his daughter's hand in marriage, she takes with her a gift: Sarah-her slave and half sister.  Theodora knows that her daughter, Clarissa, is not the proper Southern belle she appears to be, with ambitions of loving whom she chooses.  Sarah, in turn hides behind the facade of being a docile house slave as she plots to escape.  Both women bring these tumultuous secrets and desires with them to their new home, igniting events that spiral into a tale beyond what you ever imagined possible, and it will leave you enraptured until the very end.

From the book jacket

Review:  This is a much more honest book about slavery than the other ones I've read.  It talked about about some of the horrific treatments of slaves but also about how kind some of the masters could be.  While it was honest, it wasn't too hard to read because it didn't focus on those events-you could skim past those events if you are really squeamish.  The book focuses on the lives of the two women who are connected together by the plantation.  This story wasn't action packed but it did keep my attention and made it hard for me to put the book down.  There was some suspense that you could try to guess but wasn't confirmed until the very last page when Sarah talks about what she had to do.  I felt this book fell a little bit short because of the characters.  I didn't have an emotional connection to them as I have in other books.  I wanted to keep reading to find out what happened to them but I didn't feel their emotions.

Rating: 4 stars