Book Synopsis:
We whisper the names of the ones we love like the words of a song. That was the taste of freedom to us, those names on our lips.
Mary Grace, Micah, Thomas Augustus, Cherry Jane and Mercy.
These are the names of her children. The five who survived, only to be sold to other plantations. The faces Rachel cannot forget.
It’s 1834, and the law says her people are now free. But for Rachel freedom means finding her children, even if the truth is more than she can bear.
With fear snapping at her heels, Rachel keeps moving. From sunrise to sunset, through the cane fields of Barbados to the forests of British Guiana and on to Trinidad, to the dangerous river and the open sea.
Only once she knows their stories can she rest. Only then can she finally find home.
Inspired by the women who, in the aftermath of slavery, went in search of their lost children.
My Review:
Wow this was a beautifully written, emotional story that will stay with me for a long time.
Firstly I loved the vivid descriptions in this book that made me feel I was actually there experiencing everything alongside the characters. The Caribbean seems like a beautiful place and I enjoyed seeing what flowers and animals they had there. The writing in the book has a lyrical style to it which helps draw the reader into the story. It sometimes felt like the river Rachel travels along was the narrator in the story because of this and it gave the book a kind of dream like quality to it.
Rachel was a strong lady who I thought was incredibly brave after all she’s gone through. As a mum myself I know I’d do anything to get my kids back in a similar situation so I really sympathised with her and wanted her to succeed in finding her children. I felt it took a while to get to know her properly though as the reader is thrown straight into the story and it takes a while for her background story to be explained.
Overall I really enjoyed this story which is hard to believe is the author’s debut. It’s a very emotional read and my heart broke reading about the hardship of life in the plantation and how awfully the slaves were treated. Rachel’s journey to find her children was definitely not an easy one and I found myself very invested in the story, wanting to keep reading to see if she finds her children. I look forward to reading more from this author in the future.
Huge thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me onto the blog tour and to Headline for my copy of this book.
About The Author:
Eleanor Shearer is a mixed-race writer and the granddaughter of Windrush generation immigrants. She splits her time between London and Ramsgate so that she never has to go too long without seeing the sea. For her Master’s degree in Politics at the University of Oxford, Eleanor studied the legacy of slavery and the case for reparations. Her fieldwork was in St. Lucia and Barbados. The inspiration for River Sing Me Home came to Eleanor after she discovered a tiny footnote in an exhibition she was attending about the Windrush. Mothers in slavery in the British colonies lived in constant fear of their children being sold. When the Slavery Abolition Act came in in the 1830s, it didn’t mean freedom, so many mothers went in search of their lost children.
Over The Rainbow Blog 
Sounds very powerful. Thanks for this review.
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