A Needed Reminder

5 out of 5 stars

First and foremost I need to call out the timeliness of this release.  It came out a couple weeks before February, which is Black History Month.  I knew that this was going to be a poignant story about a slave in North Carolina but it was so, so, so much more.

Shamaan Casey absolutely crushes the narration of The Freedman – Tales From a Revolution – North Carolina (I’m going to shorten it to Freedman throughout the review when mentioning since it’s a long title). He was able to voice the slave (and then free) Calabar in such a way that really made me feel like I was transported back there.

Tie that in with the writing style and storytelling ability of Hedbor and you have a story that I will not soon forget. It’s not often that a book teaches me something about history that I instantly have to look up but Freedman will be one of those books.  I am going to do some research on the rights and freedoms of those who were freed by their owners.  It was honestly never a piece of history that I’d ever even considered but it’s now one that I need to know more about.

Freedman is such a real and visceral story.  Numerous times throughout I was brought to tears by the writing and performance.  The book is full of emotion.  It has a lot of negatives but also reminds us of the people that would have risked it all to help out another human regardless of their skin color.

Calabar (known to his owner as Jupiter) is seriously a character that I will remember for a long time.  The way he spoke (purposefully done in a way that made you understand he was an uneducated slave) made me like him even more.  I felt for him and I wanted to help him

Not only is this a book that is needed for history’s sake, but it’s badly needed for the state that our country is currently in.  It’s a not-so-simple reminder of the atrocities that we have done in the name of our beliefs and for the almighty dollar. And it’s a reminder of the path that we need not go back down.

For all the reasons above and more that I haven’t stated, this book is easily one of the best books I’ve read so far in 2019.

Book Description:

The Freedman: Tales from a Revolution- North Carolina by Lars D.H. Hedbor
Narrator: Shamaan Casey
Length: 5 hrs and 19 mins
Series: Tales from a Revolution #9
Published by Brief Candle Press on January 17th 2019
Genres: Historical Fiction, YA
Also by this author: The Wind: Tales from a Revolution: West-Florida, The Prize: Tales from a Revolution - Vermont
Also in this series: The Wind: Tales from a Revolution: West-Florida, The Mine: Tales From a Revolution - Connecticut, The Prize: Tales from a Revolution - Vermont
Brian
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