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Author:

Williams, Sheila (Sheila J.), author.

Title:

Things past telling : a novel / Sheila Williams.

Edition:

First edition.

Publisher:

Amistadan imprint of HarperCollins Publishers,

Copyright Date:

2022

Description:

339 pages ; 24 cm

Subject:

Slavery--Fiction.
African American women--Fiction.
African American midwives--Fiction.
Women slaves--Fiction.
Courage--Fiction.
Historical fiction.

Summary:

Born in West Africa in the mid-eighteenth century, Maryam Prescilla Grace--a.k.a "Momma Grace" will live a long, wondrous life marked by hardship, oppression, opportunity, and love. Though she will be "gifted" various names, her birth name is known to her alone. Over the course of 100-plus years, she survives capture, enslavement by several property owners, the Atlantic crossing when she is only eleven years of age, and a brief stint as a pirate's ward, acting as both a spy and a translator. Maryam learns midwifery from a Caribbean-born wise woman, whose "craft" combines curated techniques and medicines from African, Indigenous, and European women. Those midwifery skills allow her to sometimes transcend the racial and class barriers of her enslavement, as she walks the razor's edge trying to balance the lives and health of her own people with the cruel economic mandates of the slave holders, who view infants born in bondage not as flesh-and-blood children but as investment property. Throughout her triumphant and tumultuous life Maryam gains and loses her homeland, her family, her culture, her husband, her lovers, and her children. Yet as the decades pass, this tenacious woman never loses her sense of self.

ISBN:

0063097079
9780063097070

OCLC:

(OCoLC)1257018352

Locations:

BOPG851 -- Ames Public Library (Ames)

WUPB305 -- Arnolds Park Public Library (Arnolds Park)

TCPG826 -- Bettendorf Public Library Information Center (Bettendorf)

SAPG074 -- Cedar Falls Public Library (Cedar Falls)

YTPG232 -- Clinton Public Library (Clinton)

CBPF522 -- Coralville Public Library (Coralville)

XXPH787 -- Council Bluffs Public Library (Council Bluffs)

TDPH826 -- Davenport Public Library (Davenport)

YUPD232 -- DeWitt Community Library (De Witt)

BAPH771 -- Des Moines Public Library (Des Moines)

FXPH314 -- Carnegie-Stout Public Library (Dubuque)

CAPH522 -- Iowa City Public Library (Iowa City)

S1PD771 -- Johnston Public Library (Johnston)

ZKPC437 -- Logan Public Library (Logan)

WMPC185 -- Marcus Public Library (Marcus) — F WIL

GOPG641 -- Marshalltown Public Library (Marshalltown)

GCPC771 -- Mitchellville Public Library (Mitchellville)

FPPC224 -- Murphy Helwig Library (Monona)

ELPC715 -- Paullina Public Library (Paullina)

GMPD771 -- Pleasant Hill Public Library (Pleasant Hill)

XAPE737 -- Shenandoah Public Library (Shenandoah)

LAPH975 -- Sioux City Public Library (Sioux City)

GDPF771 -- Urbandale Public Library (Urbandale)

CIPB482 -- Victor Public Library (Victor)

CXPC586 -- Keck Memorial Library (Wapello)

SFPH074 -- Waterloo Public Library (Waterloo)

ZOPC437 -- Woodbine Carnegie Public Library (Woodbine)