"On the surface, Pudd'nhead Wilson possesses all the elements of an engrossing nineteenth-century mystery: reversed identities, a horrible crime, an eccentric detective, a suspenseful courtroom drama, and a surprising, unusual solution. Yet it is not a mystery nove. Seething with the undercurrents of antebellum Southern culture, the book is a savage indictment in which the real criminal is society, and racial prejudice and slavery are the crimes"...

Washington Black is an eleven-year-old field slave who knows no other life than the Barbados sugar plantation where he was born. When his master's eccentric brother chooses him to be his manservant, Wash is terrified of the cruelties he is certain await him. But Christopher Wilde, or "Titch," is a naturalist, explorer, scientist, inventor, and abolitionist. He initiates Wash into a world where a flying machine can carry a man across the sky; where...

Irish fiddler Sullivan escapes from prison after being implicated in the loss of Erasmus Kemp's slave ship, only to reencounter his nemesis in a struggle that pits Kemp's desire for wealth against Sullivan's advocacy for the disadvantaged.

A fictionalized account of how in 1849 a Virginia slave, Henry "Box" Brown, escapes to freedom by shipping himself in a wooden crate from Richmond to Philadelphia.

Under the cover of night, twelve-year-old Homer flees Southerland Plantation with his little sister Ada, unwillingly leaving their beloved mother behind. Much as he adores her and fears for her life, Homer knows there's no turning back, not with the overseer on their trail. Through tangled vines, secret doorways, and over a sky bridge, the two find a secret community called Freewater, deep in the swamp. In this society created by formerly enslaved...

"The son of a wealthy plantation owner and a doting mother, Augustus Mungo St John is accustomed to the wealth and luxuries his privilege has afforded him. That is until he returns from university to discover his family ruined, his inheritance stolen and his childhood sweetheart, Camilla, taken by the conniving Chester Marion. Fuelled by anger, and love, Mungo swears vengeance and devotes his life to saving Camilla - and destroying Chester. Camilla,...

A novel that spans one hundred years and is set in Virginia during the Civil War and a century beyond explores the brutal legacy of violence and exploitation in American society as it examines the fates of the inhabitants of Beauvais Plantation and their descendants.

A saintly Black man endures the depredations of slavery and the torments of a cruel overseer. Mr. Shelby is a considerate master, but to pay off debts he must sell Tom to Haley, a slave trader. Eliza, Mrs. Shelby's servant, fearing that her son Harry will also be sold to Haley, escapes to Ohio taking Harry with her. St. Clare purchases Tom from Haley after Little Eva befriends the pious slave. Eva dies from an illness, and St. Clare decides to free...

Continuing their adventures through space and time, Ben and his faithful dog, Ned, find themselves in the Mediterranean region in 1703, befriended by a troupe of traveling entertainers and relentlessly pursued by ruthless Barbary slave traders.

"Kept as forced labor on a chocolate plantation in the Ivory Coast, Amadou and his younger brother Seydou had given up hope, until a young girl arrives at the camp who rekindles the urge to escape"--