Libertie is growing up during the Reconstruction era, training under her mother, a black physician.

This book started out interestingly enough, but as it went on it got slower, and more boring, and then uncomfortable, then annoying, and then kid of infuriating. And the ending was pretty dissatisfying for me. I just really need a strong female character and Libertie didn't really make any choices for herself until the last couple pages, but then it just ended.

Trigger warnings: the n words, sexual assault, victim shaming.

I found the writing pedestrian and the pacing long. The story of Libertie and her growth was less interesting than the idea of her mother being a Black female physician in the 1800's. Or even the support her mother and Madame Elizabeth gave to escaping slaves.

This novel tells the story of Libertie, the black daughter of a free woman doctor in New York, beginning during the Civil War and ending during Reconstruction. The opening scenes describe smuggling a slave to freedom, but portray the complexities of the man's life after slavery. Although free from slavery herself, Libertie feels trapped by her mother's ambitions and dreams for her, at the same time that their relationship is extremely close. After her mother enrolls her in college so that she can also become a doctor, Libertie finds new interests and friendships but does not engage in her studies and finally flunks out. Meanwhile, her mother has taken on an apprentice from Haiti of whom she is very fond, and Libertie feels that she has been displaced in her mother's affections. The intense mother-daughter relationship seemed a bit muddled at times, and when Libertie ended up marrying the apprentice and moving to Haiti, the estrangement between mother and daughter did not make much sense to me. The theme of various types of freedom and entrapment make this a story worth reading.

I was not sure what to expect when I plunked Libertie from my staggering TBR. I had not read Kaitlyn Greenidge before, but I was drawn to both the themes in the jacket description and the novel’s unique setting. I have not encountered many stories set in Haiti, and I could not resist jumping at the opportunity to indulge my interest in culturally diverse historicals.

Greenidge’s novel is not a strict biographic fiction, but both Cathy and Libertie Sampson are modeled on real people. The inspiration for Dr. Cathy Sampson came from the life and achievements of Dr. Susan Smith McKinney Steward, the first African American woman to earn a medical degree in New York state. Dr. Steward had two children with her first husband, Rev. William G. McKinney, and while I could not find much about either online, I did discover a New York news clipping announcing the marriage of Anna M. McKinney to Louis Holly of Port-au-Prince.

I do not know how Greenidge developed her fiction, but I love how she draped her ideas around authentic experiences. The author put her own spin on the story to spotlight notions of race, colorism, gender, feminism, autonomy, and freedom, but the structure of the novel is a compliment to the lives that sparked Greenidge’s imagination in the first place. I do not mean to downplay the thematic material, the underlying motifs of this novel touched my heart, but I feel the decision to explore these ideas through the lens of a mother-daughter relationship took this story to another level.

A perceptive, thought-provoking, and illuminating narrative, Libertie is a story well-worth seeking out

Libertie is a black girl living with her doctor mother who helps slaves in their run to freedom. Libertie thinks her mother is herself enslaved by her work, but after she marries and moves to the Caribbean, things seem less clear.

Kaitlyn Greenidge created absolutely memorable characters in Libertie and her mother, as well as the supporting cast. This book read like a feature film. I could envision every scene, and completely enjoyed how complex Libertie's life was.

I do hope I get to see it made into a film.

A free-born black girl Libertie has a lot to live up to ... her single mother is both a doctor and helps escaped slaves. Libertie's mother wants her to be a doctor as well, but she is filled with anger at how blacks are treated and the way her mother relates to white people, and so she rebels against her chosen path. Interesting tale of a woman trying to find her own way and finding the courage to act once she decides.

Libertie was one of those wonderful novels that felt like three separate books. The first portion of the novel had an aura close to magical realism for me. It interpreted the true story of Dr. Susan Steward (called Dr. Cathy Sampson in the novel), New York's first Black woman physician. Her young daughter, Libertie, tells the story, which is full of the magic of "resurrecting" patients who have faked their own deaths to escape slavery. This first section drew me in the most.
The second two sections tell the story of Libertie as a young woman in college, and then as a bride, I'm trying to avoid spoilers -- but the character of Libertie frustrated me to no end. I know that she's based on a real person, and real people make some frustrating choices about their lives. This story hit deep, though, as a mother and an educator.
Kaitlyn Greenidge's writing is exquisite. I will seek out her past and future novels.

Read if you: Want a unique, compelling, and intriguing historical fiction read about the first Black female doctor in the United States.

Although some parts do tend to drag a bit, this kept my interest and attention throughout the entire story. However, I was rather disappointed that an author’s note was not included; I’m hoping there will be one in the finished edition. (Publishers—please include author’s notes, research notes, etc in digital ARCs.)

Many thanks to Algonquin Books and NetGalley for a digital copy in exchange for an honest review.

This mother-daughter drama in a mid-19th century free Black community gets off to a strong start. Libertie is at first in awe of her mother, one of the first Black female physicians, who appears to bring a dead man back to life. But things take a turn after Dr. Sampson is unable to cure the man, who is a runaway slave, of his mental anguish. This section was especially powerful, particularly the imagery of the man’s lost love, “the woman in the water,” which resonates throughout the story.

Libertie is expected to become a doctor too, but she resents her light-skinned mother for agreeing to treat white women who look at her dark-skinned daughter with disgust. She neglects her studies and becomes interested in music – or rather, she becomes fixated on a singing duo, in what I felt was the weakest part of the story. There follows a hasty marriage to another doctor and a move to his family home in Haiti, where she faces challenges including estrangement from her mother.

This is a thought-provoking novel that addresses racism, colorism, sexism, and what it means to be free. Libertie is a complex character with perhaps a tendency to overthink things. If I’m honest, I think I would have preferred a story focused on her mother, with all her flaws.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the review copy.

This is a lovely and powerful historical fiction novel about race, feminism, mother/daughter relationships, and so much more! Libertie is a strong protagonist with so many struggles to overcome. Libertie's mother is a doctor, an astonishing accomplishment for a woman of color during that time period, and she wants nothing less for Libertie. Libertie wants to follow her own path however, exercising whatever limited freedoms she has. It's always amazing to me to read a book like this and realize that while so much has changed, so much remains the same. If you enjoy historical fiction, don't pass this book by.

✨Book Review✨
Libertie, by Kaitlyn Greenidge, is a beautifully written historical fiction about young Libertie and her transition into adulthood.
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I especially love the beginning of the novel, with the innocent eye narration. Greenidge's writing is mesmerizing, especially in the way Libertie idolizes her mother and sees her medicinal treatments as magic. Their relationship and Libertie's coming of age are central to the plot, as Libertie matures and tries to figure the world out for herself.
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There are several parts of this story that make me very uncomfortable, but they pale in comparison to what I have learned about history and culture. I could definitely see myself teaching this novel in a high school setting.
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I also adore the bits of Kreyól peppered throughout the novel. My nanny is from St Lucia, and she always spoke to us in Patois, so I would read those particular passages aloud and I would hear them in her voice. I didn't understand everything I read in Kreyól, but I was able to understand most of it.
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I would like to thank Netgalley for this Advanced Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review.

Kaitlyn Greenidge's ambitious novel introduces readers to one of the first black woman doctors, who raises her free-born daughter alone, shortly after the Civil War has ended in Brooklyn. The mother passes as white, or close enough as white, to be more accepted, whereas her daughter is dark-skinned, something the mother admires, and yet fears for her daughter's future. The mother starts teaching her daughter the lessons of homeopathy at a young age, having her by her side as she works with patients, believing her daughter, Libertie, will follow in her footsteps and take over her practice one day.

After Libertie is sent to an all-black boarding school, she meets two girls who are singers, and becomes more intrigued with signing than botany, and is informed she will not be able to return the next year. Unwilling to confront her mother with this news, a young doctor from Haiti, who has been interning with her mother, proposes to her fairly quickly, and against her mother's wishes, she marries him and sets off to Haiti, where she discovers a woman is not treated equally, and she begins to miss her independent mother, and realizes that she's not happy as a married woman, but hopes she will be a good mother after she learns she is pregnant.

The novel is not a demanding novel, but it is an engaging read. I am not sure how well the journey to Haiti fit in with the novel, since so much of he novel was about the mother and daughter, and the mother does write letters to her daughter, but she doesn't answer, and it isn't until her two friends from the boarding school come to Haiti to perform, that Libertie decides to make some decisions about her life, instead of letting others make decisions for her. Throughout the novel, readers are reminded not only of what it means to be a woman, especially a black woman, but what freedom means to a woman.

To understand and exercise #freewill is not an easy concept to put into practice. Understanding the legacy of slavery, colorism and religion bind her commmunity, libertie grows into her name over the course of her passage from girlhood to womanhood. Her powers of observation and reflection, honed by her mother's relentless tutelage, enable her to retain autonomy in the face of patriarchy and conformity.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3646037903

I wanted to like Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge but I just could not get there. I like historical fiction--especially when it teaches me about a time and people that I have not read much about before, and Libertie delivers on that. The novel begins at the end of the Civil War and continues through reconstruction, and follows Libertie, the daughter of a black, female doctor. Her mother wants Libertie to follow in her footsteps, but Libertie longs for something else. All the pieces for a great book are here, but the plot moves too slowly, and the characters--including Libertie--are not drawn out enough to balance that. Greenidge’s writing is more than OK, but she needs to work on her pacing, and some better editing might have helped.

This breathtaking novel is both a mother/daughter story and a historical fiction exploration of Black life in New York City and Haiti in the years of the Civil War and afterwards. Written in the title character's voice, we come to understand her homeopathic physician mother's complicated involvement in helping enslaved people find freedom while raising Libertie singlehandedly. Freedom in all its varied senses weaves throughout the book-- freedom from slavery, freedom of and from religion, freedom to love and forgive, freedom to speak shameful history, freedom to choose what to become and where to call home.
I found myself wanting more for Libertie, even as she exercised the freedom she could claim in making major life choices. This book will stick with me for a while and I can't wait to talk with people about it when it's published.

My NetGalley copy of this book had missing text beginning some of the paragraphs. Thankfully, it didn't impede the flow of the story, although it gave my brain extra puzzles to decode.

#NetGalley, #Libertie

A young black woman fights against her desire to please her visionary physician mother and her need to live her own life. Set in the years before, during and after the Civil War, Libertie explores racism, colorism, and classism.

Kaitlyn Greenidge’s Libertie is a thoroughly engrossing narrative in a richly created world. The title character, Libertie, demonstrates curiosity, vulnerability, and an enduring resistance that serve as both the engines of the plot and the tools of resolution in a way that is incredibly satisfying. The weight of expectation that Libertie feels as the daughter of a Black female doctor through the years of the Civil War and beyond—to follow in her mother’s footsteps—is drawn with exactness, and the ways in which Libertie pushes back against those expectations (even to the point of leaving college) adds complexity to the character. Libertie cannot be reduced to a symbol, and the missteps she makes because of her strained relationship with her mother are immensely human. Greenidge’s text plays with the characters’ various kinds of naivete and jadedness in ways that put characters with intense emotional ties and affections at odds with each other—it’s masterfully done.

The secondary characters who populate the book’s world—from Ben Daisy to Libertie’s school friends to Emmanuel’s household in Haiti—add further depth and complication. Libertie’s longing for a sense of belonging cannot penetrate her friends’ paired-off state, solidified not only by their musical talents but their romantic relationship; Libertie’s Americanness sets her at odds with the status quo in Haiti, and even where she seems to seek an ally in the housekeeper of her husband’s father’s household, the connections remain unsettled. The shifting lonelinesses, the push and pull of dissatisfaction that ripples around the edges not only of Libertie’s primary relationships but also her secondary relationships, keeps the novel moving forward.

A note regarding my Netgalley text: There were some missing words in the copy I received. These seemed to be mostly confined to the beginnings of paragraphs/beginnings of sections. I do not think this significantly impacted my broad understanding of the work, but it did impede clarity from time to time. Most often, the first letter of a word remained (though the word did not), which helped to clarify if a passage was beginning with a character’s name.

"Libertie", the incredible novel from the brilliant Kaitlyn Greenidge, is set in the time prior to, during, and directly after the US Civil War. It was arguably the worst of times when slavery was the top issue of the day with family members willing to kill each other over its continuation or abolition. Escapes from bondage were acts of desperation, as were slaughters and lynchings when escaped slaves were found. Some made it through due to the heroic acts of Abolitionists along the Underground Railroad. 

Life in the North was desired, but far from settled. Those that had made it from slavery carried an awful burden, both physical, but more debilitatingly, mental. There were few medical professionals that had any understanding about how to make people whole. Libertie's mother was one of them. She is one of the very first female, Black doctors. She is 100% dedicated. She is broken and flawed as a Mother.

"Libertie" takes us and her from Brooklyn to an HBCU in Ohio and eventually to Haiti. Her journey is intense and complex. It is all very different from what I expected, which is a very good thing. "Libertie" is about racism at a systemic and fundamental level. It is about "religion", both the ritualized Western religion that has come to dominate, and the African mysticism that followed the slave boats both to North America and the islands, particularly Haiti. It is about sexism and abuse, especially the Patriarchy. It is about science and the healing arts, gender, and betrayal.

"Libertie" is profoundly sad, but hopeful. It needs to be read.

Thanks to Algonquin Books and NetGalley for the dARC.

It took me a while to read this book because I didn't want it to end. The liberation of Black women: Who defines it? How do we achieve? Does it look the same for every Black woman? Although set in a different time period, the author did such an amazing job on character development and story-telling, that I felt like it could be written today. I still don't have the words to process what this book means to me, a dark-skinned Black girl who has gone against all of the standards of my family and society, that's still searching for true liberation.