Sunflower Sisters by Martha Hall Kelly

Reviewed by: Becky Houghton, Reference Assistant

What is This Book About?:  Told from the perspective of three women during the U.S. Civil War and based heavily on fact and historical documents, Sunflower Sisters details the roles of women during the war from nurses to spies to slaves.  Georgianna “Georgy” Woolsey takes a very active role in the war by training and serving as a field nurse in Maryland, the Capital in Washington and the Gettysburg battlefield.  Georgy, her mother, and sisters all aid the Union war efforts in various ways as abolitionists. In contract, Anne-May Watson is a southern slave owner originally from New Orleans, but an inheritor of a tabaco plantation in Maryland.  Through a cruel, abusive overseer, Anne-May mistreats those working on her farm and does all she can to keep the institution of slavery alive and well in the south. Jemma, a young slave girl, and her family are Anne-May’s property and their efforts to escape slavery and serve to end the institution comprise the third perspective of the story.  Told chronologically through each of these women’s stories, a gripping, vivid tale of the Civil War years is revealed.

My Review: I loved this book! Kelly’s writing style of relating the events through the eyes of three different women from very diverse backgrounds gives a strong sense of accuracy to her accounts and draws the reader into the story that she tells.  While some events related are not pleasant, Kelly’s strong characters and how they handle the events kept me engrossed in story.  It is realistic because many of the characters and events portrayed actually existed as is revealed in the author’s note at the end of the novel.   I have always enjoyed both fiction and non-fiction about the civil war, so highly recommend this book to the lovers of historical fiction!

Three Words that Describe this Book: Gripping, Powerful, Realistic

Give This A Try if You Like… Martha Kelly’s previous titles Lost Roses or Lilac Girls or if you just enjoy books about the tumultuous Civil War years in the United States.

Rating: 5/5

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Black Birds in the Sky: The Story and Legacy of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre by Brandy Colbert

Reviewed by: Melissa Friedlund, Reference Specialist

Genre: American History (early 20^th Century)

Suggested Age: Teen, Adult

What is the book about? It has only been in recent years that knowledge of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre has become more well-known. For decades, even the people of Tulsa didn’t acknowledge or often speak about it. What started as an attempt to lynch a young man accused of sexual assault, turned into a race riot that left churches, homes, and businesses burned to the ground, as well as hundreds dead. This book not only details the timeline of events that took place in Tulsa, Oklahoma on June 1^st, 1921, it first lays the foundation with an explanation of culturally significant events and practices that contributed to the mob violence and destruction that devastated a thriving African American community.

My Review: I listened to the audiobook version of this book and found it to be incredibly enlightening. This is a cautionary tale about mob mentality and the darker side of human nature, especially when it comes to race relations. I found it extremely beneficial to have the background information laid out before the author went into the description of the exact events of this tragedy. Learning about events that may be disturbing or hard to accept give us a clearer picture of our predecessors and the society they lived in. This is critically important to understanding how our society today has developed into what we see around us and can help keep up from repeating past mistakes.

Three Words That Describe This Book: Illuminating, Educational, Revelatory

Give This a Try if You Like…Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo” by Zora Neale Hurston, The 1619 Project: A New origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Four Hundred Souls edited by Ibram X. Kendi

Rating: 5/5

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