An Undisturbed Peace by Mary Glickman
Wow. This is the kind
of book I really love. The layers of
story between Abrahan Bento Sassaporta Naggar, a Jew from the squalor of London
who comes to America indentured to his uncle in Georgia, Dark Water of the Mountains, also known as
Marian, and Jacob a slave all set within President Andrew Jackson’s Indian
Removal Act makes for a sit up late at
night read.
The whites are moving in and they want land. Land that the
Native Americans cared for, lived on and respected for centuries. As the Natives try to stem the tide through
resistance and then giving in and trying to appease the whites by living in
houses, dressing in grand clothes and hoping not to be so noticeable, like a
child sitting quietly in a corner in a room filled with adults, hoping to
listen in before being chased off. But
President Jackson is also a white man and so goes the ruling. The Natives must go.
Abrahan is not quite allowed yet to be a part of his uncle’s
emporium but must take to the road as a salesman to the settlers. He finds Marian and falls in hopeless love
with her. But Marian does not want to be found or loved. She lives her life in solitude
running from the whites and her own demons of the past.
Jacob is in hiding, protected by the Native Americans because
of events in his past.
As Abe trades with the settlers and Native Americans he sees
and learns a lot, forms his own judgements which are not the common ones of
whites, and tries to protect both Marian and Jacob as their stories play
out. The Indian Removal Act is nothing
to be proud of and Jacob can see many parallels in his own life as a Jew.
This is a really, really good book.
Sounds great. I am enjoying learning history through stories such as these. They whet my appetite to understand more of the political history through the lives that would have been lived in those times.
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