Feeding The Ghosts

Fred D’Aguiar

FROM THE ARCHIVES

First Sentence:     The sea is slavery.

Back of the book:

Inspired by a true story, this suspenseful and deeply moving novel chronicles an incident of courage and rebellion that took place aboard a disease-riddled slave ship returning from Africa. It was called Zong, and when disease threatens to infect all aboard, the ship’s captain orders his crew to seize the sick men, women, and children and throw them into the sea. But one female slave, Mintah, survives drowning and secretly climbs back onto the ship. From her hiding place, she attempts to rouse the remaining captives to rebel against the killings, becoming a dangerous force on the ship — a force which is reckoned with in a shocking court case. Powerful and poetic, Feeding the Ghosts is an unforgettable testimony to the struggle against oblivion and a reminder about history overlooked and truth distorted.

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Horses

Keith Ridgway

First Sentence:     In the broad spaces of the streets near the square, Matthew stood and watched for the secrets which the rain reveals.

Back of the book:

Horses is the story of a storm, and of grief and arson and revenge. A priest, a doctor and a policeman on a single wild night south of Dublin, struggle with the unpredictability of a teenage girl, and a man with no shoes.

Quotes from the book:

“It was a thing about the rain. having to go into it from a dry place, that was harder than being in it all the time.”

Her horses were dead and in the sky, and the sky whinnied and shook off water and kicked up sparks beneath its hooves.

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