WAKE // BOOK REVIEW

Here’s what Wake: The Hidden History of Women-Led Slave Revolts is about:

Women warriors planned and led slave revolts on slave ships during the passage across the Atlantic. They fought their enslavers throughout the Americas. And then they were erased from history.

In Wake Rebecca Hall, a historian, a granddaughter of slaves, and a woman haunted by the legacy of slavery tells their story. With in-depth archival research and measured use of historical imagination, she constructs the likely pasts of women rebels who fought for freedom on slave ships bound to America, as well as the stories of women who led slave revolts in Colonial New York. Beneath both is Hall’s own tale: of a life lived in the shadow of slavery and its consequences.

It took me a while to get my thoughts back into place after I finished reading WAKE. This subject has been fascinating for me since the time I started to try to understand human psychology and the extent to which it can be detrimental. Unfortunately, there is no end as such. I am truly grateful to Allen Lane and Particular Books for this gifted copy.

There has been an extensive amount of research done for this novel. Focus being on the underrated and forgotten aspects of slavery, WAKE has truly made me trace my way back to the initial timeline of the slave trade. It was interesting to see how the author framed the novel around the concept of a professor working on her research on women leading slave revolts throughout history. As she dives deeper into the topic, she finds out more and more about her own past, and how society has been changing, or is it? A difficult question to answer. It is quite easy to feel those different emotions the author is going through, the disappointment, rage, hollowness as we go through the story and learn about the women fighting for their lives.

WAKE is a compelling, sophisticated, insightful, and important read. It is beautiful to see how Rebecca Hall is telling her own story by mixing her ancestral history with global events to convey the truth. Highly recommended!