* AN OPRAH''S BOOK CLUB PICK *-A spectacular achievement- ANTHONY DOERR-Extravagantly beautiful- DAILY MAIL-One of the greatest writers of all time- JACQUELINE WOODSON-Extraordinary- GUARDIAN-The best book I-ve read in years- LOUISE KENNEDY-----------------------The first weapon I ever held was my mother''s hand.On a slave plantation in the Carolinas, Annis has survived in the light of her mother-s resilience, comforted by stories of her African warrior grandmother. Everything she knows, she learned from her mother - how to fight, how to be strong, how to grow up in a world shrouded in darkness.When she is sold south by the white enslaver who fathered her, Annis must venture onward through the rich but unforgiving landscapes of the American South alone: from the rice fields of the Carolinas to the slave markets of New Orleans, and into the fearsome heart of a Louisiana sugar plantation. Searching for relief in
