By: Zehra Jaffri
Over the summer, along with many other books I read, I was able to read this book by Sue Monk Kidd. The setting of the book is placed during the early 1800s to the mid 1800s in Charleston South Carolina. The story consists of two female leading characters. One is Sarah Grimke, a wealthy white girl who lives among many slaves. The other is Handful who is a slave herself. The plot of the book starts off with the two girls only being 9 to 11 years old. The story takes the reader on a journey through these women’s lives until they are middle aged.
Sarah Grimke starts off as a very conflicted child who never really understood the purpose of inequality. Once after she saw a horrible beating of a slave, she went mute for a while and stuttered on and off ever since then. I think that that was the point when Sarah started to hate slavery. Her whole life, Sarah was opposed to slavery, which I find fascinating since she has been living her whole childhood with slavery surrounding her. When she was gifted a slave (Handful) for her 11th birthday, she refused but was then forced to keep one. Sarah is someone who has trouble expressing her thought and beliefs. Given that she did have many firm beliefs. Growing up she had the dream to become a jurist, however, that dream was rejected when her family told her that that is not something a woman does. Still Sarah knew that she wanted to one day make a difference in the world.
Handful is a slave who was only a couple years younger than Sarah. She grew quite close to Sarah in their early years. Handful is a stronger woman who is rebellious. She is clearly fed up with being a slave and never thinks of herself as less than anyone else. She soon followed the footsteps of her mother in which she had the great desire to be a free woman.
The relationship between Sarah and Handful is shown to be close even if they are far apart. Whenever the thought of giving up on slavery came to Sarah, I think that Handful is what motivated her to keep going to free slaves which would include Handful. Sarah teaches Handful how to read as a little step to her freedom and also fulfills her needs as a friend would.
This journey of Handful and Sarah’s is filled with a lot of hidden integrity of friendship and freedom of one’s inner and outer self. Throughout the book they both find out about who they really are and what their purpose is in the world.
The best thing about this book is that it is based on the lives of two real people. In the end, I really encourage you to read this book that might just be out of your comfort zone!
