#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • PULITZER PRIZE WINNER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • A magnificent tour de force chronicling a young slave's adventures as she makes a desperate bid for freedom in the antebellum South. • Now an original Amazon Prime Video series directed by Barry Jenkins.
Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. Life is hell for all the slaves, but especially bad for Cora; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she is coming into womanhood—where even greater pain awaits. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Matters do not go as planned—Cora kills a young white boy who tries to capture her. Though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted.
In Whitehead’s ingenious conception, the Underground Railroad is no mere metaphor—engineers and conductors operate a secret network of tracks and tunnels beneath the Southern soil. Cora and Caesar’s first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city’s placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom.
Like the protagonist of Gulliver’s Travels, Cora encounters different worlds at each stage of her journey—hers is an odyssey through time as well as space. As Whitehead brilliantly re-creates the unique terrors for black people in the pre–Civil War era, his narrative seamlessly weaves the saga of America from the brutal importation of Africans to the unfulfilled promises of the present day. The Underground Railroad is at once a kinetic adventure tale of one woman’s ferocious will to escape the horrors of bondage and a shattering, powerful meditation on the history we all share.
Look for Colson Whitehead’s new novel, Crook Manifesto, coming soon!
The Underground Railroad is a book that I discovered on Litsy this past month and fit one of the challenges from the Read Harder Challenge from Book Riot so I decided to dive in.
This is my first Colton Whitehead book and I have to say I’m very impressed. The writing is beautiful and I think the more alternate moments in this were well done and really showed the extremes oft the time period. The fact that the Railroad takes on the physical manifestation of a a true railroad, hidden deep under the earth, really highlight the interconnection of the Railroad as well as the dangers to those operating it and how much work is involved in keeping the railroad running. We see the tireless work of those who maintain it and see the heaviness of the mystery of those who create and built it. The fact that time is spend describing the uncertainty and the terror involved with the escape, and less on the journey itself, brings in a more personal account to the story. We see Cora deal with the darkness of not knowing where she will end up and the fast paced escape that happens almost blindly in her terror. I think this book focuses more on the feelings involved during this time period and less on the physical true-ness of the acts. In some ways it does feel like it might diminish the amount of work involved in the Railroad and with those who fought to escape, but I feel that the heaviness of the emotion provided makes up for it.
The Underground Railroad is very much an account from a slave woman named Cora, as she grows tired of her bonds and makes her escape. It takes place in several places and we get to see the horrors and wonders of each new place that Cora visits. I really liked Cora, but I would have loved her more if this story had taken place through her eyes instead of 3rd person. This is a emotion heavy book, but having that ‘from a distance’ look sort of dampens the ability to connect with her.
I’m very happy I took a chance on this one. It’s hard to read at times but I definitely recommend it.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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26 August, 2016:
Finished reading
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26 August, 2016:
Reviewed