Andrene Graham Recommends: "The Book of Negroes" by Lawrence Hill

I am not a novel reader but when one of my clients suggested I read, The Book of Negroes, by Lawrence Hill, I couldn’t resist.


The Canadian author Lawrence Hill, who currently resides in Hamilton Ontario, ironically where I grew up, wrote the novel. In 2007, The Book of Negroes was published in the United States as Someone Knows My Name. It is inspired by the African Americans who were resettled in Nova Scotia, and some of those who later chose to go to Sierra Leone, where they created colony freedmen in Africa. He features Aminata, a young black woman who is literate and acts as a scribe to record the information about the former American slaves. Those who founded Sierra Leone have been described as settlers who "brought America to Africa". 


I highly recommend this book to all but especially to our Israelite teenagers. It not only speaks of our culture and history as Black people, but it also shadows our original Israelite culture and the way we were stripped and brainwashed into our slave owner’s culture. It is a clear depiction of how we were treated and how we overcame at that time, but we still have a long, long way to go. If our teens know what we went through, and know that we are in the last cycle of the 400 years, I am just modestly suggesting they can assist with us coming out with great substance by sharing knowledge and remembering our God that will free us finally out of mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual slavery.