this book is great! It is a historical account of Ms. Tademy's family heritage. Three generations of women play major roles in this book. It was very touching and heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time.

I liked this book a lot. It did not dwell upon the detailed cruelty of slavery but rather the strength of the people who endured through generations of changes. It was an interesting look at plantation life in central Louisiana for over 125 years.

This book surprised me. Author Tademy gave up a plumb job at Sun Microsystems, I believe it was, to research her roots and bring us this novel (she's since written a second.).

The story is strong and vividly written, with characters it is easy to love and who stay with you for a long time after you close the book.

This is one I liked so much, I've picked up spare copies to spread around.

I really liked how it followed them for years, it really gave them growth and see how different things shaped them. It kept me really drawn in and caring about the characters.

This book was amazing! If you like historicaly correct, generational novels you will love this book. Set on the plantations of Louisians Cane River in the 1800's, you will follow 7 generations of strong women fighting to make life better for the next generation.

A good look at slavery. Written as a memoir. It is still very shocking to me that we enslave people as a human race. It rimnds us to not forget history and to realize that slavery is still going on today. It was a hard book to put time and a times very emotional.

Excellent!

From Our Editors
When the urge hit her, Lalita Tademy was corporate vice president of Sun Microsystems: "I had the feeling there was something else I was supposed to do." While she was deciding what that something else was, Tademy spent two years researching "the slave branch" of her family, "my mother's side." Returning to her ancestors' Cane River roots, she scouted old sharecroppers' farms; ransacked old courthouse archives; plotted a paper trail from grueling bondage to better days. Then, discovering what "I was supposed to do," she sat down to write this novel about the lives of slaves who were never allowed to write it themselves. Genealogy with wings.

From the Publisher
Mingling historical fact with fiction, Lalita Tademy's epic novel is based on the lives of four generations of African American women and is the result of years of exhaustive research and an obsessive odyssey to uncover her family's past.

Four generations of brave women battle injustice in Louisiana's Cane River.

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We can be thankful that Lalita Tademy found an interest in her family's history...sparked by family memories of Emily "Tite"....a strong woman that passed many generations before Lalita experienced Colfax and Cane River, Louisiana.

The passion she poured into her search for her family's history provides the gift of this novel, which weaves the details and truths she was able to unearth about the generations of slaves that came before her with her own imaginings of the details and happenings of their days.

Unlike some novels about the slave experience, Cane River is written in straight-forward prose with a focus on the people and personalities - not dwelling unnecessarily on the cruelty and ugliness inherent in slavery. In fact, the ugliness of their situation is treated somewhat matter-of-factly, which I supposed it would have been by the slaves themselves, who would have had no choice but to accept their circumstances.

The players in this book are powerful, passionate and intriguing. The action is engaging and plot propelling. A tremendous work of historical fiction.

This book chronicles the epic story of several generations of black women in the south. It begins in the time of slavery through the Civil War and beyond. It is a great character driven novel whose backdrop is very educational and rich.

Tells the tale of five generations of black women and their families - from slavery to freedom or what is perceived as freedom. This was an Oprah book club selection.

A captivating read reminiscent of Roots.

Great book, the dialects are a little hard to understand sometimes but overall a great read.

A pleasure to read. I hated to put it down. I am looking forward to reading her other book Red River.

an oprah book sublime histtttorical novel

It was a wonderful book - the stories of many generations of this family in Louisiana and their struggles and triumphs. Slavery to freedom. I hated when it ended!

Women from four generations of a southern family struggle to unite their family and gain success. From slavery to the twentieth century, this books portrays family life as never before.

A unique accomplishment, this is history never before told, an epic novel of four generations of African-American women based on one family's actual meticulously researched past.

This is a very good, well written and easy reading book.

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