2018 School Spending Survey Report
In this emotionally wrenching pre–Civil War story, Pheby Delores Brown, born a house slave on a Virginia plantation, is the biracial child (then referred to as “high yellow”) of a proud African mother and fathered by their white owner. Before her mother’s dream for her of freedom and education when she came of age—as promised by her slave-owning father—can be realized, the “spoiled” 16-year-old Pheby becomes a target of the plantation owner’s jealous wife, and is sent to a notorious jail where the enslaved are broken and tortured. She becomes the “yellow wife” of the disreputable white jail owner. Pheby lives in fear of her sadistic husband, and her dreams of freedom and protecting those she loves grow more desperate with the birth of each child, and the passing years.
VERDICT This well-researched and intensely moving fifth novel by Johnson (And Then There Was Me) is perfect for fans of historical fiction with strong female characters such as The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom and Wench by Dolen Perkins-Valdez. Book clubs looking for #OwnVoices authors will be powerfully impressed by this story of a lesser-known aspect of the history of slavery in the American South.
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