Jemma has been taught to read by her previous owner, and Anne-Marie, who is not good at reading or writing, uses Jemma for both those purposes. Jemma is a slave on Anne-Marie’s plantation in Maryland. She gets her chance when she is accepted for training by a female doctor who, like Georgy, is a “staunch abolitionist.” But she wants to be treated as an equal and longs to become a nurse, to help the Union war effort.

Georgy has six sisters and a beau who wants to marry her and turn her into a housewife. … These planters will never give up slavery willingly.” The event roots their commitment to emancipation even further: “Every black face in the street or greeting us so kindly at a front door reminded us of the system of slavery so robust there and strengthened our resolve to continue the fight.” Already abolitionists, the Woolseys are horrified. And I do mean “entirely.”Īs the story begins, members of the Woolsey family, visiting South Carolina, witness slave babies being put up for sale at an auction, where the babies’ mothers are also sold, separately from their children. We watch events pan out from the point of view of several different characters: Georgy Woolsey, part of a large family living comfortably in New York Jemma, a slave trying to survive the godawful system and get away if she can and Anne-Marie, a young, just-married Southern belle who owns Jemma, among other slaves, and is entirely self-concerned.

The book is set in North/South border states, major cities and battlefields from 1859 to 1864, just before and during the Civil War. From its title, Sunflower Sisters by Martha Hall Kelly sounds like it could be happy-smiley-giggly “women’s fiction,” doesn’t it? Perhaps a lot of fashion, romance and swooning? Nope.

Sunflower sisters book review