Finn: A Novel

Book Description

In this masterful debut by a major new voice in fiction, Jon Clinch takes us on a journey into the history and heart of one of American literature’s most brutal and mysterious figures: Huckleberry Finn’s father. The result is a deeply original tour de force that springs from Twain’s classic novel but takes on a fully realized life of its own.

Finn sets a tragic figure loose in a landscape at once familiar and mythic. It begins and ends with a lifeless body–flayed and stripped of all identifying marks–drifting down the Mississippi. The circumstances of the murder, and the secret of the victim’s identity, shape Finn’s story as they will shape his life and his death.

Along the way Clinch introduces a cast of unforgettable characters: Finn’s terrifying father, known only as the Judge; his sickly, sycophantic brother, Will; blind Bliss, a secretive moonshiner; the strong and quick-witted Mary, a stolen slave who becomes Finn’s mistress; and of course young Huck himself. In daring to re-create Huck for a new generation, Clinch gives us a living boy in all his human complexity–not an icon, not a myth, but a real child facing vast possibilities in a world alternately dangerous and bright.

Finn is a novel about race; about paternity in its many guises; about the shame of a nation recapitulated by the shame of one absolutely unforgettable family. Above all, Finn reaches back into the darkest waters of America’s past to fashion something compelling, fearless, and new.

Praise for Finn
“A brave and ambitious debut novel… It stands on its own while giving new life and meaning to Twain’s novel, which has been stirring passions and debates since 1885… triumph of imagination and graceful writing…. Bookstores and libraries shelve novels alphabetically by authors’ names. That leaves Clinch a long way from Twain. But on my bookshelves, they'll lean against each other. I’d like to think that the cantankerous Twain would welcome the company.”
–USA TODAY

“Ravishing…In the saga of this tormented human being, Clinch brings us a radical (and endlessly debatable) new take on Twain’s classic, and a stand-alone marvel of a novel. Grade: A.”
–ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY

“A fascinating, original read.”
–people

“Haunting…Clinch reimagines Finn in a strikingly original way, replacing Huck’s voice with his own magisterial vision–one that’s nothing short of revelatory…Spellbinding.”
–WASHINGTON POST

“Meticulously crafted…Marvelous imagination…The Finn of Clinch’s novel is certainly a racist villain but also psychologically disturbed and disconcertingly compelling.”
–SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

“From the barest of hints in Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, Clinch has created a fully believable world inhabited by fully realized characters. Clinch treads dangerous ground in making one of America’s greatest novels his jumping-off point, but he brings it off magnificently…The language of this book is one of its great beauties…Finn is far from one-dimensional, and that is another beauty of the book. Clinch has a knack for putting us squarely inside the heads of his characters….Clinch draws as compelling and realistic a picture as any we’re likely to find…Finn stands on its own. The richness of its language, the depth of its characters, the emotional and societal tangles through which they struggle to navigate add up to a portrait of life on the Mississippi as we’ve never before experienced it.”
–dallas morning news

“His models may include Cormac McCarthy, and Charles Frazier, whose Cold Mountain also has a voice that sounds like 19th-century American (both formal and colloquial) but has a contemporary terseness and spikiness. This voice couldn’t be better suited to a historical novel with a modernist sensibility: Clinch’s riverbank Missouri feels postapocalyptic, and his Pap Finn is a crazed yet wily survivor in a polluted landscape…Clinch’s Pap is a convincingly nightmarish extrapolation of Twain’s. He’s the mad, lost and dangerous center of a world we’d hate to live in–or do we still live there?–and crave to revisit as soon as we close the book.”
–newsweek

“I haven’t been swallowed whole by a work of fiction in some time. Jon Clinch’s first novel has done it: sucked me under like I was a rag doll thrown into the wake of a Mississippi steamboat…Jon Clinch has turned in a nearly perfect first book, a creative response that matches The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in intensity and tenacious soul-searching about racism. I wish I could write well enough to construct a dramatic, subtle and mysterious story out of careful, plodding and unromantic prose, but for now I’m just happy to have an alchemist like Jon Clinch do it for me.”
–BOOKSLUT

“Finn strikes its most original chords in its bold imagining of possibilities left unexplored by Huckleberry Finn.”
–austin american-statesman

“An inspired riff on one of literature’s all-time great villains…This tale of fathers and sons, slavery and freedom, better angels at war with dark demons, is filled with passages of brilliant description, violence that is close-up and terrifying…Everything in this novel could have happened, and we believe it… so the great river of stories is too, twisting and turning, inspiring such surprising and inspired riffs and tributes as Finn.”
–new orleans times-picayune

“A triumph of succesful plotting, convincing characterization and lyrical prose.”
–ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS

“Shocking and charming. Clinch creates a folk-art masterpiece that will delight, beguile and entertain as it does justice to its predecessor…In Finn, Clinch expands the bloodlines and scope of the original story and casts new light on the troubled legacy of our country’s infamous past.”
–new york post

“In Clinch’s retelling, Pap Finn comes vibrantly to life as a complex, mysterious, strangely likable figure…Clinch includes many sharply realized, sometimes harrowing, even gruesome scenes…Finn should appeal not only to scholars of 19th century literature but to anyone who cares to sample a forceful debut novel inspired by a now-mythic American story.”
–atlanta journal-consitution

“What makes bearable this river voyage that never ventures far beyond the banks is the compelling narrative Clinch has created. He writes exceedingly well, not with the immediacy Twain imbued to Huck's voice, but with an impersonal narrator’s voice that almost perversely refuses to take sides. And the plot is masterful.”
–fredericksburg freelance-star

“Disturbing and darkly compelling…Clinch displays impressive imagination and descriptiveness…anyone who encounters Finn will long be hautned by this dark and bloody tale.”
–hartford courant

“Jon Clinch pulls off the near impossible in his new novel, Finn, which brings Huck's dad to life in all his terrible humanness…Clinch vividly paints the origins of the amazing Huck...powerfully told.”
–winston-salem journal

“Gripping…he inventively remaps known literary territory…the descriptive riffs are lucent.”
–chicago tribune

“The best debut so far of 2007.”
–men’s journal

“Inventing Huckleberry Finn’s father using only the thin scraps of information that Mark Twain provided is a pretty admirable feat, and reading Jon Clinch’s first novel provides an almost tactile pleasure…Clinch clearly respects Twain, but he doesn’t feel especially cowed by his inspiration, and some of his inventions qualify as genuine improvements on the original text.”
–washington city paper

“In this darkly luminous debut…Clinch lyrically renders the Mississippi River’s ceaseless flow, while revealing Finn’s brutal contradictions, his violence, arrogance and self-reproach.”
–Publishers Weekly, STARRED review

“Bold and deeply disturbing. . . A few incidents duplicate those in Twain,
but the novels could not be more different; instead of Huck’s unlettered child’s voice,
we have an omniscient narrative, grave, erudite and rich in the secretions of adult knowledge;
terse dialogue acts as an effective counterpoint. All along, Clinch’s intent
is to probe the nature of evil . . . a memorable debut, likely to make waves.”
–KIRKUS REVIEWS, STARRED review

“Every fan of Twain’s masterpiece will want to read this inspired spin-off, which could become an unofficial companion volume.”
–LIBRARY JOURNAL, STARRED review

“This is a bold debut that takes a few tentative steps in tandem with the familiar Twain,
but then veers off dexterously down a much more insidious, harrowing path.”
–BOOKLIST

“Jon Clinch’s first novel Finn…succeeds wonderfully because its gritty lyricism is at once authentic and original…reminiscent at times of Cormac McCarthy…the eloquence of the telling will never make the courageous reader wish for a gentler touch. Like any appealing novel, Finn achieves the force of a dream with fascinating actions, indelible characters and spellbinding language. Its ...

Customer Reviews:

Suspend your disbelief and it's pretty good.......2007-09-27

If your favorite folk song got reworked by Queen, you might like it. Or maybe not.

The writing is vivid, the "I can't put it down," type, and this is good because there are built in roadblocks: you know what's gonna happen to Pap Finn before you even pick up the book, the language and history are not in sync with the time represented, and--most importantly, Clinch fails to convince me that Huck is half black.

I am aware that the inspiration for Huck was very likely a black boy Twain knew, whom everyone envied for his freedom. However, the boy Twain talks about was not someone Twain said hated and denigrated [his own race]. In Twain's book, Huck's racism comes so naturally to him, and his realization that Jim is a human being is so difficult for him, it is not possible to reconcile that person with one raised lovingly by a black mother. In addition, by the time Finn lies to Huck about his mother Huck knows Pap to be a liar about everything else.

That said, Clinch delivers quite a few "Aha! THAT explains it!" moments, such as his explanation for why there was writing on the walls of the "house of death" or how Huck got so superstitious. And his pictures of the Widow and of Judge Thatcher are intriguing.

Good for when you're already in a nasty, cynical mood. Also good for making me want to pick up Huck Finn again.

Fascinating.......2007-09-12

Finn is not an easy book to read because, in its own way, it is even more horrifying than the fantastical books by writers such as Thomas Harris who splash gore around to such a degree that their books lose all sense of realism. The horrible crimes that are committed in Finn, on the other hand, always make the reader cringe simply because they seem to be happening to real people in a real world. As is so often the case in a man like Finn, he is the product of cold and abusive parents who warped him from the beginning. He is in constant rebellion against his father, a town judge who rules his courtroom and his home with an iron fist and who has no more sympathy for his sons than he does for the criminals he sees in court.

Clinch, of course, begins with the world created by Mark Twain in Huckleberry Finn but he fleshes out that world in a way that Twain himself was unable to do in the period in which he wrote. Using incidents and characters from Twain's book, Clinch provides the back story to Huck's tale that explains much of what Twain had to leave unsaid in the original.

The elder Finn depends on the Mississippi River for his very life. The river provides him with the catfish that he sells or exchanges in town for the supplies that keep him alive. More importantly to Finn, it is the sale of those same fish that make it possible for him to consume the amount of alcohol that makes life worth living for him. Equally important, the Mississippi is always there to cover a man's sins and, as the book begins, one of those sins, a dead woman who has been skinned, is floating down the middle of the river toward town. But since Finn is a psychopath this is hardly the last of his crimes that the reader will witness.

The most controversial aspect of the novel is Clinch's contention that Huck was a mulatto whose mother had been purchased off a steamboat in slave territory and taken back to Illinois against her will. That Huckleberry Finn was a black child is not a new theory, and Clinch has made that possibility the centerpiece of his novel. That fact alone determines the ultimate fate of not only Finn but of Mary, Huck's mother, and it leads to the complete moral collapse of Judge Finn.

This may not be an easy book to read, and I don't feel that I should say that I enjoyed it, but it is definitely one that will stay with me for a while. I've read many books that I can barely remember any details of just a year or two later. Finn is in no danger of becoming one of those.

FINN, a dark chapter of racism in America.......2007-09-11

When you read FINN by Jon Clinch, you are immediately taken back to the 19th century where the story begins about the detestable life of Pap Finn, the father of Huckleberry Finn from Mark Twain's THE ADVENTURES OFFINN HUCKLEBERRY FINN.

FINN is a sequel to Huckleberry Finn concentrating on the life of Huck's father and his misdeeds. The writing is formal and the slang mimics the language used at that time so much so that you sometimes don't know what they are talking about.

Clinch, a professor of American literature, breathed life into some of the characters from the original story - the widow Douglas, Judge Thatcher and even weaves the $6,000 in gold Huck found in the cave.

The thrust of this book, however, is the character Finn, a laid back drunkard, who shuns authority and all its trappings including his respectable father, Judge Thatcher and his often spineless brother, Will, who cannot stand up to the Judge.

But what comes across most powerfully in this story is the raw brutality of life, the cruelty to others, the subsistent poverty and the entrenched disregard and racism towards blacks. The characters treat blacks in the story no differently than you would a bug found in your house and don't even flinch when they sometimes swat the life out of these innocents for a wrong word or an indifferent look. The brutality is so intense in some of the scenes that I cringed reading it. However, Clinch says in his note at the end of the book that these characteristics were, "...all drawn whole from Twain's novel and followed here to their likely ends."

FINN is the dark version of Huckleberry Finn portraying the brutality and cruelty of life in the 19th century and perhaps Clinch was trying to awaken us to the horrors and senselessness of blatant racism.

Pretentious.......2007-09-04

This seems like a college writing class assignment taken too far. Or a literary publicity stunt. I don't understand the idea of attaching yourself to someonelse's work. I'm unhappy, beacause I was actually excited to read this book. Now everytime I read Huck Finn I have this book's stain to erase.

First it is so slow that it put me to sleep every 10 pages.

I don't understand why it is written so far from Twain's style. I know he's not trying to be Twain, but he's using Twain's setting, characters and some of his scenes!

Why put in big words, like micturate, when Twain didn't. Should we be impressed?

Can we also stop with novels mixing up the timeline! Is this supposed to make it more excitng or mysterious? If your story isn't good enough for a linear timeline then something is wrong.

The part that really pushed me over the top was the afterword, the author talks about being humble and reverential but then concludes that Twain would have liked what he did with his characters. Come on.

I would recommend this book to insomniacs and fishermen. We have to read about catfish every page.
Everyone else stay away and don't ruin Huckleberry Finn for yourself.

Very good.......2007-07-29

The supple and complex "Finn" is a good example of what I would call gorgeous writing. The prose loops around grandly at times, but there is a legitimate end to this approach. Layers of intent and personality are detected, examined and explained. Most thoughful readers will find delight in that process.

One minor frustration with this novel? It sometimes needed more of the hard slap of context, if only as interlude.

Epic Journeys of Freedom: Runaway Slaves of the American Revolution and Their Global Quest for Liberty

Average customer rating:

A Most Amazing Book
A side of the American Revolution little known until now

Epic Journeys of Freedom: Runaway Slaves of the American Revolution and Their Global Quest for Liberty
Cassandra Pybus
Manufacturer: Beacon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

ASIN: 0807055158

Book Description

The astounding story of runaway slaves during the American Revolution and the lives they forged on four continents

Customer Reviews:

A Most Amazing Book.......2006-08-29

The first three "official" reviews of this book fail to convey the sheer original, revealing, even emotional nature of this book. Many Americans now accept that their patriotic Revolutionary ancestors--including the Founding Fathers--owned slaves. Some Americans are aware that many of these slaves fled to the British controlled areas and cities under the promise of gaining freedom. A few Americans may then know of what happened to these former slaves--how many were take off to Nova Scotia with thousands of white Loyalists. What Cassandra Pybus reveals in this book opens all this up into dimensions undreamed of by all but perhaps a literal handful of historians. And in fact, what she presents is more like a nightmare than a dream. In an impeccably researched and footnoted narrative, she first investigates those three relatively "knowns" that I referred to above, providing details that will astound most of us. And when she goes onto present the story of what happenened to most of these former slaves as they movd on not only to Nova Scotia and London but then on to Sierra Leone and Australia--well, it is history as revelation. Although Pybus stays rooted in the strictest procedures of the historian, the end effect is to feel you are reading a novel. But a novel describing events of such unnmitigated misery, of human suffering, of human cruelty, that no novelist would dare invent these happenings. I defy any reader to put the book down saying (a) "Oh, I had suspected all this might have happened" and (b) "In any case I can't see getting especially worked up over it." The end result is a book that both charges far more human beings than we have imagined with being cruel to African-Americans and at the same time informs us of how many of these same African-Americans endured these cruelties and utimately prevailed. In a word, I found it spellbinding!

A side of the American Revolution little known until now.......2006-04-05

While most American schoolchildren in the U.S. are taught of the American Revolution as a glorious struggle of backwoods colonials fighting for their freedom and independence against the world's most powerful empire, few, if any, are taught of the great tragedy experienced by African-Americans, many of them former slaves, who fought with or sided with the British in the hopes that they would secure their individual freedoms. I was one of those many schoolchildren inculcated in the myth of the Revolution, but I have since expanded my knowledge of the Revolution beyond the history texts. Despite this, I was not aware of the globe-circling stories of former slaves of the American Revolution as carefully documented and researched by Cassandra Pybus in "Epic Journeys of Freedom". But now that I am, I hope these stories become more widely known as examples of not only the failure of the American Revolution to live up to its ideals, but more important, as examples of the unquenchable human desire for freedom and the extent to which brave men and women will go to find it.

I cannot do justice to any of the individual stories in "Epic Journeys of Freedom" in this or any review, and much of the immediacy and drama of the stories come from the first-hand sources of the era that Pybus has collected and orchestrated into compelling narratives. By retelling the history of individual lives set within the context of the American Revolution and its aftermath, Pybus reduces a mythic, seminal event in America's founding to a personal level. The eyes through which we see the Revolution, however, belong not to the victors, but to the disenfranchised and dehumanized; America's victory meant their enslavement, so they fled the land of liberty to seek their own freedom across distant borders and oceans.

Some may ask why bring up more stories of America's past injustices when we have come so far in addressing them. We read these stories and remember their lives because they remind us why men and women have risked all and died for their freedom. They remind us of both our worse and better natures, and offer hope for a more just and free world.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Unabridged Classics)

Average customer rating:

The Greatest American Novel
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Unabridged Classics)
Mark J. Twain
Manufacturer: Sterling
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1402726007

Book Description

Mark Twain’s brilliant 19th-century novel has long been recognized as one of the finest examples of American literature. It brings back the irrepressible and free-spirited Huck, first introduced in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and puts him center stage. Rich in authentic dialect, folksy humor, and sharp social commentary, Twain’s classic tale follows Huck and the runaway slave Jim on an exciting journey down the Mississippi.

Customer Reviews:

The Greatest American Novel.......2007-09-14

"Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain is the greatest American novel. Because it is our greatest novel it has been reviewed, analyzed, admired and vilified probably more than any book in American literary history.

Everyone knows the story. Huckleberry Finn is a character introduced in "Tom Sawyer". He's the neglected son of the town drunk. After discovering a small fortune with Tom at the end of Tom Sawyer, Huck is given a home with spinsters. The idea is to `civilize' Huck. That means bathing regularly, going to school, church in order to elevate him above the level of poor white trash.

(Forgive me for using the term. But author is unsparing in his use of language considered to today to be politically incorrect. We'll discuss this more later.)

Huck's father's paternal instincts are stimulated by the smell of money. He wants custody of his son. Unfortunately the law is on his side. Huck decides to run away. Inadvertently he takes one of the household slaves with him a runaway named Jim. They ride down the Mississippi River on a raft and sail into the annals of literature.

The single largest misconception about "Huckleberry Finn" is this is a children's novel. It is often given to children as a gift or taught in junior high English class. Twain was master of American dialects. His characters speak as they should for their time and place. Consequently, the n-word is used extensively. If you're the only black kid in the class, constant use of this word could make things uncomfortable.

This one of the reasons this book this book keeps winding up on the banned lists. But to put this book on the banned list in the name of political correctness is short-sighted and ignorant.

Another reason this is not a kids book is it tackles issues and situations far beyond the junior high level. The average 13 year old simply does not have the life experience to fully appreciate the book.

Huck and Jim represent the dregs of pre-Civil War southern society. All their lives they've been reminded of this. They must always listen to the counsel of their `betters', be it con men, childless old ladies or noble families hunting each other to extinction. Most of their `adventures' are because they yield their better judgment to idiots.

But there is a notable exception. Jim ran away rather than be sold away from his children forever. He's not as interested in freedom as much as he is in taking care of his family. Huck is conflicted because he's stealing an old woman's property. However he begins to see this `property' as a human being.

The point where Huck decides he will go to hell before he returns Jim to an uncertain future is one of the greatest moments in the history of American letters.

Huck and Jim may not be the smartest people in the world. But they both show presence of mind, loyalty, devotion and love in abundance.

In short, they represent the best of humanity.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.......2007-05-18

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Most everything about this book was GOOD!
This book had many interesting unexpected moments! It had a great blend of mystery, suspense, and surprises. All of the chapters had a great sense of imagery. Mark Twain describes every character with great detail. You can imagine what every character is wearing and what they look like. It is a great fiction book.
This book takes place out in the Mississippi River where two men from different races are looking for adventure and are traveling for freedom. There is murder, a feud, and a lot of adventure. In the book you are faced with many problems like how will Jim (the slave) get freed, or how will Huck Finn find a way to get away from his alcoholic father.
This book had my attention ever since I picked it up! This is a good book for young adults because of the outdoor setting and some mature words.
In the end this book has a great moral and teaches you so much on how to treat others and how you want to be treated. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants an adventure!

Average customer rating:

great read
Questionable change of authorship
REVIEW QUOTES
a worthy read, some dull parts
Masterful reconstruction of the life of a Cuban slave

Biography of a Runaway Slave
Miguel Barnet
Manufacturer: Curbstone Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1880684187

Book Description

...a powerful account of a vanished world...invaluable.-Newsweek

"Its contribution to our understanding of Cuban history and national temperament is no less than its immense appeal as a human testament....All the fire and dash of the Cuban character, the refusal ever to cringe or to give up, take on flesh and meaning in the reminiscences of this stubborn veteran."-Times Literary Supplement

Miguel Barnet lives in Havana, Cuba, where he was born in 1940. He is the originator of the tradition of "Testimonial" fiction in Latin American letters, and he remains the genre's acknowledged master.

Customer Reviews:

great read.......2007-05-14

This book gives great insight into a slave's life and his attitudes before and after freedom. He also tells about living in the woods as a runaway. Well worth the money.

Questionable change of authorship.......2004-05-25

In the preface to the (translated) 1968 edition of "The Autobiography of a Runaway Slave" (by Esteban Montejo, edited by Miguel Barnet), Barnet describes how Montejo had recounted his life story and adds, "Esteban soon became the real author of this book. He was constantly looking at my notebook, and he almost forced me to write down everything he said."

Though I do not own a copy of the recent edition, it is very puzzling that Barnet now lists himself as first author, followed by the translator, with Montejo's name last. Certainly the work of an editor or translator is arduous, and deserves proper credit. Yet both are distinct from the author's.

It's both an irony and a shame that Barnet, who is a white member of Cuba's ruling elite, seems to have appropriated the story of a poor, black slave, whose protests and defiance more than 100 years ago would surely be considered counter-revolutionary today.

REVIEW QUOTES.......2001-08-21

"...a powerful account of a vanished world...invaluable." --Newsweek

"An extraordinary record of a bygone era...Montejo reveals an appealing personality as he talks of women, religion, and politics. His descriptions of the activities and treatment of slaves on the Spanish plantations before and after abolition are fascinating. A rare record of history as it was lived..." --Library Journal

"Its contribution to our understanding of Cuban history and national temperament is no less than its immense appeal as a human testament...All the fire and dash of the Cuban character, the refusal ever to cringe or to give up, take on flesh and meaning in the reminiscences of this stubborn veteran." --Times Literary Supplement

a worthy read, some dull parts.......2001-04-19

some of this book was fascinating...to me. i found the old man's recollections of so many aspects of long-past cuba's rural life just gripping, but even moreso, to have it told, more or less, in his words, just added a special dimension that no other type of book could really create. i felt like i was being led on a journey by a character of such realness that no true "biographer" or fiction writer could approximate it.

particularly good parts: his descriptions of the cruelty of cuban slavery, of the cruelty of whites, of his ideas about sex, about certain aspects of the war for independence

now for the bad stuff: some of it, i must admit, just dragged. he was a religious/mystical guy, and all his descriptions of the old religions, though certainly realistic and valid, were just boring to me, and i started skimming. also, in part this book was the recollections of a 105 year old man, and so, while i give such an old man credit for being able to tell a good story (or perhaps the credit is due to the editor), it still reads at point like...an old man's story, and not an old man who has a true gift for story-telling. as for plot, forget it. suspense...think again. drama...no. just the facts, and thank god they're interesting enough on their own.

Masterful reconstruction of the life of a Cuban slave.......2000-06-15

Miguel Barnet, eduated in Havana at an American school, came to discover his Cuban heritage later in life. His tour-de-force was The Life of a Runaway Slave, the as-told-to-biography of Estaban Montejo, an earthy, candid man who had runaway from the sugar fields and who had fought in Cuba's wars for independence. One thing readers must remember is that Barnet intevriewed Montejo when the latter was 103 years old, in a nursing home, in 1963 when the interviews were started. Oral history is difficult enough and this great time-lag makes the task of the interviewer even more dificult.

The Runaway Quilt : An Elm Creek Quilts Novel

Average customer rating:

The Runaway Quilt
Awesome
Runaway Quilt
I love this book
The Runaway Quilt

The Runaway Quilt : An Elm Creek Quilts Novel
Jennifer Chiaverini
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0743222261

Book Description

The fourth book in the popular Elm Creek Quilts series explores a question that has long captured the imagination of quilters and historians alike: Did stationmasters of the Underground Railroad use quilts to signal to fugitive slaves?

In her first novel, The Quilter's Apprentice, Jennifer Chiaverini wove quilting lore with tales from the World War II home front. Now, following Round Robin and The Cross-Country Quilters, Chiaverini revisits the legends of Elm Creek Manor, as Sylvia Compson discovers evidence of her ancestors' courageous involvement in the Underground Railroad.

Alerted to the possibility that her family had ties to the slaveholding South, Sylvia scours her attic and finds three quilts and a memoir written by Gerda, the spinster sister of clan patriarch Hans Bergstrom. The memoir describes the founding of Elm Creek Manor and how, using quilts as markers, Hans, his wife, Anneke, and Gerda came to beckon fugitive slaves to safety within its walls. When a runaway named Joanna arrives from a South Carolina plantation pregnant with her master's child, the Bergstroms shelter her through a long, dangerous winter -- imagining neither the impact of her presence nor the betrayal that awaits them.

The memoir raises new questions for every one it answers, leading Sylvia ever deeper into the tangle of the Bergstrom legacy. Aided by the Elm Creek Quilters, as well as by descendants of others named in Gerda's tale, Sylvia dares to face the demons of her family's past and at the same time reaffirm her own moral center. A spellbinding fugue on the mysteries of heritage, The Runaway Quilt unfolds with all the drama and suspense of a classic in the making.

Customer Reviews:

The Runaway Quilt.......2007-09-22

The Runaway Quilt: An Elm Creek Quilts Novelis well written with characters you care about. In addition, it provides a history lesson about the underground railroad that is anything but boring.

Awesome.......2007-07-26

I thought this book was the best one so far in the series. If you have never read any of the Elm Creek Quilt books, then be sure to start at the beginning with The Quilter's Apprentice.

Runaway Quilt.......2007-06-08

Great book.....a must read for those who are into quilts and good stories!!

I love this book.......2007-01-15

I have read the three first books in this series. I loved them and was eager to read this one too. This book has answered some questions I had about Anneke and Gerda. The history about the Underground Railroad was interesting and it was facinating to see how it impacted the family.

The Runaway Quilt.......2006-07-18

Jennifer Chiaverini is amazing. This book was yet another that I couldn't put down. Who knew that an author could be so talented as to write novels based on quilting that would be so riveting? Jennifer Chiaverini is now one of my favorite authors because she mixes two of my favorite things (reading and quilting) so well!

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain Library)

Average customer rating:

Simply Amazing
lmona@ptloma.edu's Review
Twain's masterpiece
"The Greatest Book Ever!"
Update your Library

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain Library)
Mark Twain
Manufacturer: University of California Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0520228383

Book Description

This is the first edition of Huckleberry Finn ever to be based on Mark Twain's entire original manuscript--including its first 663 pages, which had been lost for more than a hundred years when they were discovered in 1990 in a Los Angeles attic. The text of the Mark Twain Library edition (first published in 1985) has been re-edited using this manuscript, restoring thousands of details of wording, spelling, and punctuation that had been corrupted by Mark Twain's typist, typesetters, and proofreaders. The revised Mark Twain Library Huckleberry Finn is sure to become the standard edition for all students and readers of Mark Twain.
The authoritative new edition of this beloved work includes all of the 174 first-edition illustrations by Edward Windsor Kemble, which the author called "rattling good." It also contains a new gathering of manuscript pages, photographically reproduced, and an appendix of passages from the manuscript, including the long-lost "ghost story," which illustrate how extensively Mark Twain revised his work. The editors have also revised and updated their explanatory notes, the maps of the Mississippi River valley, and the glossary of slang and dialect words.
The story of Huck and his companion Jim, a runaway slave, as they travel down the Mississippi to escape from slavery and "sivilization" has been delighting readers around the world since Twain first published it in 1885. Simply put, it is a masterpiece: revolutionary in its narrative method, surpassingly funny, and at the same time deeply perceptive about human nature. No other American novel of the nineteenth century still commands so vast an audience, and certainly no other retains the capacity to stir controversy with its sharp satire on American racism.
A Responsible Critical Text
To produce this authoritative critical text, the editors studied all aspects of Mark Twain's manuscript, working notes, proof sheets, and letters. To judge the authority of every variant, they created a unique electronic database that made it possible to analyze--by speaker and date of composition--every word in the manuscript and first edition.
An Inside View of How Mark Twain Wrote Huckleberry Finn
The new appendixes of "Three Passages" and "Manuscript Facsimiles" will give teachers and students as well as the general reader a close-up view of Mark Twain's writing process. They can follow the evolution of three key passages, as the author searched for the right word, the truest dialect, and the most telling description.

Customer Reviews:

Simply Amazing.......2006-03-08

Wow.....wow....I mean, really, this book is just amazing. Abso-f-in-lutely wonderful. It's role as the quintessential American novel is so well deserved you can't help but wonder if this is the best read you might ever have. I m currently going through all the classics of the world, and have such joys as Moby Dick, War and Peace, Robinson Crusoe, among many, many others awaiting me. However, I feel like I ve already found the love for the written word that I felt I may aquire after reading perhaps a dozen or so of the worlds finest.

To the novella: He tells the tale with such heart, such character, such life that I will attest that I dont think I ve ever felt so strongly for a character as I do for Huck Finn. He is so vivid and alive and real; its absurd.

Yes, it is quite racist on the surface, and during the 250 odd pages of the story you might read more racial slurs and statements than you have in your life, but in the heart there is nothing racist about this story. I ve heard it defended because thats just how it was in Twains time, and alas, that is how it was then, and the reason it is all so blatant, but there is really nothing racist about the portrayal of Jim. He is so loving and deep and pure. Surely one of the sweetest people you could ever want to meet.

The charm of this story, the unending humor and delight of all the dialects and wordage, the manner of conversation and the subjects....my loves for this story are unending. Its a must read. I know you ve heard that;I know you know that. But damn it, off your ass and DO IT!

Twains masterpiece, and for that matter, a masterpiece of all literature in the history of the world.

lmona@ptloma.edu's Review.......2005-12-04

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain contained many different morales.It help encouraged me to continue to listen to my heart. I love the friendship between Jim and Huck, and I know that no matter what color, or difference between society, a relationship and still survive.Many people from different place and time, took one look at this book and thought it was a racist book. What ever happened to the saying that wrote, "Don't judge a book by its cover?"Obviously, those who have read this book, knows the true meaning.
I gave this book 5 five stars not just because my teacher told me too, and that I know she is reading this, but because it truely does deserve it. I appreciate my teacher giving us an opportunity to read this novel, because I know that I wouldn't have picked it up to read it. This novel taught me many different things, which I still cherish today. I recommend this novel to anyone who loves different great morales. I recommend this novel to everyone. This novel is a great book, in which it is in need of reading!

Twain's masterpiece.......2005-10-08

I love Mark Twain, and this is Twain at his best! This is one of the best American novels of all time, in my opinion. Twain is very funny and irreverent.

"The Greatest Book Ever!".......2004-03-09

This book was great. It had so much action. It was about a boy whose father was always off drinking. When the father hears Huckleberry, also referred to as Huck, is rich the father comes back. The father beats him and gets drunk. So Huck runs off. He goes to a deserted island. While on the island he discovers that Huck's friend, a slave named Jim, also ran away and was on the same island. When Huck hears that Jim's owner is going to sell Jim they going rafting on the Mississippi to find Jim freedom. It is a great piece of literature and I strongly reccomend reading it.

Update your Library.......2003-06-01

I have been a long-time lover of Mark Twain's books. And being analytical, I want to know why something is written the way it is; I want to know the historical details behind his expression. So when I find that the Mark Twain Library has published Huckleberry Finn the way Mark Tain wanted it (unlike every edition that's ever been published, including the first!), I had to get it. Using all the explanatory notes--which are NOT cumbersome--and the glossary, and other notes about the text, I came away knowing that this book was truly what it is proclaimed to be: the best American novel ever written.

Having read just about all one can get their hands on by Mark Twain, this shed all new light on what Mark Twain was really saying when I read Huck Finn this time. The humour was more obvious, the sarcasm was more justified. The book itself opens up this door, but it helps to know what was in Mark's brain throughout his writing career.

Truly a must have for anyone into Mark Twain. I have purchased all that the MTL has put forth so far, and put my other editions in the yard sale box as errant texted that no longer interest me. I think any fan of Mark Twain will be tempted to do the same. Why read errant editions when one can have the author's intended, authoritative publication--with the original neat pixtures, too. I was so taken by this last reading of H. Finn that I've taken to memorizing some of the glossary terms. They are truly classic; bring'm back.

Book Description

In the spring of 1848 seventy-six slaves from the nation's capital hid aboard a schooner called the Pearl in an attempt to sail down the Potomac River and up the Chesapeake Bay to freedom in Pennsylvania. When inclement weather forced them to anchor for the night, the fugitive slaves and the ship's crew were captured and returned to Washington. Many of the slaves were sold to the Lower South, and two men sailing the Pearl were tried and sentenced to prison.

Amazon.com

Runaway Slaves is yet another masterpiece from the esteemed African American historian John Hope Franklin, author of the influential From Slavery to Freedom. Along with history professor Loren Schweninger, Franklin examines the often unexplored phenomenon of slave resistance--specifically, that of runaway slaves. For too long, there has been a myth that slaves were happy with their condition. Armed with the data from numerous Wanted posters, letters, county-court petitions, and newspapers, Franklin and Schweninger prove that slaves were in a constant state of rebellion with their masters. The intense circle of violence between blacks and whites was marked by property sabotage, work stoppage, assault, murder, and escape into the North. "Perhaps the greatest impact runaways had on the peculiar institution," the authors suggest, "was in their defiance of the system. Masters and slaves knew that there were blacks who were willing to do almost anything to extricate themselves from bondage." Comprehensive in scholarship and compelling in prose, this book sheds light on an underappreciated aspect of the American quest for freedom. --Eugene Holley Jr.

Book Description

From John Hope Franklin, America's foremost African American historian, comes this groundbreaking analysis of slave resistance and escape. A sweeping panorama of plantation life before the Civil War, this book reveals that slaves frequently rebelled against their masters and ran away from their plantations whenever they could. For generations, important aspects about slave life on the plantations of the American South have remained shrouded. Historians thought, for instance, that slaves were generally pliant and resigned to their roles as human chattel, and that racial violence on the plantation was an aberration. In this precedent setting book, John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger demonstrate that, contrary to popular belief, significant numbers of slaves did in fact frequently rebel against their masters and struggled to attain their freedom. By surveying a wealth of documents, such as planters' records, petitions to county courts and state legislatures, and local newspapers, this book shows how slaves resisted, when, where, and how they escaped, where they fled to, how long they remained in hiding, and how they survived away from the plantation. Of equal importance, it examines the reactions of the white slaveholding class, revealing how they marshaled considerable effort to prevent runaways, meted out severe punishments, and established patrols to hunt down escaped slaves. Reflecting a lifetime of thought by our leading authority in African American history, this book provides the key to truly understanding the relationship between slaveholders and the runaways who challenged the system--illuminating as never before the true nature of the South's "most peculiar institution."

Customer Reviews:

KIND OF HARD TO READ!.......2002-04-26

This book was interesting though rather hard to read, sort of like a text book. Sometimes there were interesting stories about people, and then you didn't hear what happened to them in the end. I think you can learn about fugitive slaves easier from other books like I WAS BORN A SLAVE. Also, I liked THE JOURNAL OF LEROY JEREMIAH JONES, A FUGITIVE SLAVE and THE DIARY OF A SLAVE GIRL, RUBY JO.

Much research.......2002-01-01

Much research went into the writing of this book and the conclusions drawn from that research are interesting. I much enjoyed the book and can see where it would be a good source for further research into the subject. The authors were also kind enough to include a large section regarding their source material. However, I can't exactly say that the writing was of a style that would keep one awake for long periods of time. If you are looking for just entertainment value, look elsewhere.

Provides wealth of details but no context.......2000-09-03

Six score and 16 years after the end of the Civil War has not dimmed many of the controversies surrounding the events leading up to that epic struggle.

In "Runaway Slaves," John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger attempt to counter one of the more insidious images: that slaves working under the plantation system were generally happy, with instances of rebellion few and far between. By quoting from contemporary records -- everything from letters and diaries to newspapers, handbills and petitions to county courts and state legislatures -- Franklin and Schweninger want to show that slaves rebelled against their masters in a number of ways.

The scope of rebellion is breathtakingly wide, ranging from a sort of civil disobedience -- complaining, refusing to work, hiding from the overseers, destroying or stealing property, mistreating the animals, to the more serious offenses such as running away, formenting rebellion or murder. Any slaves was capable of running off, from known troublemakers to the most trusted house servants. Even hired slaves, those who had earned their master's trust and were allowed to accept work in the cities and generally left alone, would run away.

"Runaway Slaves" spends several hundred pages detailing the various forms of rebellion, and that is the book's greatest strength and weakness. The sheer volume and range of these acts makes it clear what the white overlords were up again, and explains some of the extreme methods used to keep the blacks down.

But the book also doesn't give an indication of the extent of black rebellion, and thus it offers a case no more convincing than whites to point out the few blacks who fought for the Confederacy. It would have been far more effective to look at a particular county over a year and examine what went on there during that time. By cross-referencing diaries, newspapers, memoirs and other accounts, it may be possible to discover just how deep resistance to whites ran.

But for those looking for details of who ran, why, and how they were captured and punished, "Runaway Slaves" offers a wealth of details and a few choice insights.

Lays bare the frail foundation of the antebellum South.......2000-05-10

The contents of this book (covering the period from 1790 to 1860) provide a convincing argument for why the prosperous citizens of southern states felt compelled to fight a war for state's rights. The slaveholding society had acquired its rapid growth and success from the low cost production of highly labor-intensive commodities. While the abolition of slavery might have allowed a reasonable transition to a low-pay labor force, this would be the case only if, as most southerners then asserted, their slaves were generally contented with their work and treatment. On the contrary, most southern states elaborated, over nearly a century, extensive formal and informal mechanisms to keep their system of slavery from collapsing under its own weight.

The reality of profound social instability within the Southern system is brought home dramatically by Franklin and Schweninger's relentless survey of runaways. It exposes the lie in the Southern assertion that the system worked.

"In 1860, there were about 385,000 slave owners in the South, among whom about 46,000 were planters [20 or more slaves]. Even if only half of all planters experienced a single runaway in a year, and if only 10 or 15 percent of other slaveholders faced the same problem (both extremely conservative estimates) the number of runaways annually would exceed 50,000."

These numbers are staggering. It bespeaks a system under siege from within. While abolitionists often spoke of the brutalizing effect of slavery on the slaveholder, these figures offer a frightening vision of the efforts that were required to maintain slavery. In some states, over 50% of the penal code dealt with specific aspects of slave management and control. The systems of slave retrieval and the disposition of recalcitrant slaves gave birth to practices which extended well beyond the realm of slaves. Any non-white, free or otherwise, was increasingly subject to suspicion and arrest as a possible runaway slave -- the antebellum offense of WWB (walking while black).

As a student of the Haitian Revolution, I have become fairly inured to reading about the brutalities of slavery. But, while reading this book, tears filled my eyes at the recounting of numerous instances of free people of color being arrested as suspected runaways. These victims, men, women and children, were often sold into lifelong slavery. While this is not substantially different from similar events occurring on the Slave Coast, it came as a surprise that it occurred in America to free-born people as well as to those who had been manumitted. Re-enslavement was often close at hand.

"Twenty-seven black men in Prince Edward County, Virginia, for example, were listed on the county's 1847 inventory of 'free Negroes to be Sold for taxes,' including seven members of the Bartlett family -- Joe, Henry Jr., Ben Sr., George, Samuel, Charles and Jim."

WEAKNESSES: In terms of the value of the material presented, this remarkable book deserves 5 stars. Its greatest shortcoming is a consequence of the nature of the primary historical sources (advertised runaways and court documents). The hundreds of compelling stories are quite brief and often left this reader wondering, "what happened next?" But the answers are not a part of recorded history. This makes the reading somewhat choppy throughout. It is a manifestation of what Michel-Rolph Trouillot calls "silencing the past". The dominant segment of society recorded only what it wished to record.

STRENGTHS: That dominant segment has failed at obscuring (at least to readers of this book) the prevalence, intensity and cost of slave dissent. A chilling aspect of this narrative is the almost complete absence of literary sensationalism. The horror of the naked facts carry their own argument.

CONCLUSION: This book deals a fatal blow to the romantic notion of a "Gone With The Wind" society in the antebellum South. It is as much about the nature of the slaveholder as of the slave. The power of its revelations have changed my understanding of slave resistance in America.

A seminal work.......1999-12-30

An excellent work in which the authors look intensely at one aspect of a subject (runaways) to throw light on the whole (i.e., slavery and how terrible it actually was). Very readable, excellent use of primary source materials. A little slow going at first, where there's not much analysis. The problems the first reviewer cited are due to gaps in the primary sources.

The Runaways Revenge: John Newton (Trailblazer Books #18)

Average customer rating:

best one of the series!

The Runaways Revenge: John Newton (Trailblazer Books #18)
Dave and Neta Jackson
Manufacturer: Bethany House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1556614713
Release Date: 1995-10-01

Book Description

Thrilling adventure stories introducing young readers (ages 8-12) to Christian heroes of the past.

Thirteen-year-old slave Hamilton Jones seizes his freedom when his cruel master dies on a trip to England in 1775. Driven by a desire for revenge after years of mistreatment, the boy hunts down former slave trader John Newton the man responsible for bringing Hamilton's mother to the United States. Hamilton wants only one thing: to make the man pay with his life for his evil crime!

But the John Newton that Hamilton meets is nothing like the horrible person he imagined. Instead of reacting with fear when threatened with death, the little man seems calm and unafraid. Newton even agrees he deserves to die and claims to be something worse than a slave trader! Astonished, Hamilton stays to listen to the preacher's story. What could be worse than being a slave trader?

HAMILTON SEES HIS CHANCE FOR REVENGE-BUT WILL HE GO THROUGH WITH IT?

Customer Reviews:

best one of the series!.......2006-06-23

This is the best Trailblazer book I've read so far! It focuses mainly on the suspenseful, yet true story of John newton, with just a little bit of suspenseful fiction. Compared to their other books - this one has a lot more of the true story, which is so amazing - you would think it was fiction!

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