Libertie is an historical fiction set in the late 1800s. Our titular character is named for her dying father's wish for her to know true freedom. But Libertie, although intelligent, well spoken, and beautiful will struggle to be released from society's strongholds. In the book her mother's character is loosely based on Susan McKinney Steward, the first black doctor in New York state. Although this bit of history is interesting, Libertie is not focused so much on the mother's accomplishments but on the relationship between mother and daughter. Throughout the book we are asked to consider what freedom is in all its nuances and to examine the chains that hold us captive.

The book opens with Dr. Sampson raising a man from the dead. Libertie stands in awe of her mother and begs her to teach her how to heal. But she soon realizes that this man -- although he escaped the shackles of slavery and the grip of death -- he is not free. His undying devotion to a dead woman leaves him haunted by her memory and Libertie skeptical about love.

Libertie's mother is able to get her medical degree as she passes for white. But she knows this option is not open to her dark skinned daughter. She goes about trying to find a way to ensure her daughter's agency in a new unsure landscape where freedom has just been won for the slave. But in her doing so, she ends up thrusting her aspirations upon Libertie.

Despite her status and fair skin our doctor is still bound by other women's perception of her, their judgment and their fickle natures. She is confined by grief over the loss of her husband and family and fear for the safety of her daughter. Her tongue is tied every time a white patient shuns Libertie or remarks on her color.

When Libertie travels to Haiti we are able to see the contrast between the two countries. Haiti gains its independence early on and is under the rule of black people. But there still exists a separation between those that serve and those that are in authority.

Through these experiences Libertie comes to know that freedom is not just escaping that which binds you, but knowing who you are, what you want and finding the voice to proclaim it boldly.

I received a free advance digital review copy from Algonquin Books via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge is the captivating, immersive, coming-of-age story of a freeborn Black girl growing up in Reconstruction-era Brooklyn. I wanted to keep turning the pages to find out what would happen next, and at the same time, I wanted to slow down to appreciate Greenidge's beautiful multi-layered storytelling.

The novel follows Libertie's journey from Brooklyn, where she assists her mother, the first Black female medical doctor in New York state (based on the real life Susan Smith McKinney Stewart), to Cunningham College in Ohio, where she is the sole woman student enrolled in the "men's course," to her husband's family home in Haiti. Through Libertie's observations and her mother's attempts to develop an effective treatment, Greenidge explores the psychological and spiritual as well as physical traumas of slavery, which continue to reverberate after escaping to freedom. The Civil War itself is in the background, with the focus on the individual experiences of Libertie and other Black Americans, both freeborn and formerly enslaved, as they make their way in the world. A large part of Libertie's story involves her coming to terms with the pressure she feels from her mother's expectation that she will become a doctor and join her mother in her medical practice, even though Libertie is more drawn to music and poetry. Greenidge also recounts Libertie's experience as a person with darker skin, which unlike her mother, does not allow her to "pass" as white, as well as the experience of native Haitians' relationships with African American missionaries who seek to convert them to Christianity.

Libertie is historical fiction at its best because the book not only tells a compelling story with well-developed characters but also left me eager to read and learn more about events underpinning the story, from the real lives of the women on which the characters of Libertie and her mother are based to the founding of Liberia to the red chalk on the doors of Black families' homes in Manhattan, marked by whites who returned to burn the buildings and drive out their occupants during the Civil War. The words of one character recounting this event - "We have to plan for the worst of what white folks do. Because they always choose the worst." - continue to resonate today.

The novel evokes a strong sense of place with vivid descriptions that allowed me to envision the dusty road through the woods leading to Libertie's childhood home and the steep mountains, cool lakes, and air thick with humidity that she encounters in Haiti. The opening scene, in which Libertie describes seeing her "mother raise a man from the dead," like many other scenes in the book, is both compelling on the page and just waiting to be depicted on film.

Greenidge's novel explores themes of freedom, identity, and self-actualization, querrying whether these attributes can be achieved by "running away" vs. "running toward" a driving force, and raises timeless questions about whether freedom vs restraint, love vs solitude, and science vs art actually are opposing concepts or in fact may be closer than they first appear.

Libertie is the coming of age story of free born, Black woman, Libertie, daughter of free born, Dr. Sampson, the only Black female physician in Kings County who has high hopes of Libertie working alongside her one day. This story is set during the late 1800s and is told primarily in three to four parts depending on how you break things up.

The story begins with Libertie as a pre-teen helping out her mother and learning as much as she can about her future profession but then we progress to an older college age Libertie who starts to realize the medical field is not where she wants to be because she has a more artistic and poetic soul than a scientific one and the fire burning inside her mother to help people is just not there for Libertie. This realization eventually leads to her marrying a man in part to run away from her mother's disappointment and partly to experience a new life in Haiti where the couple immediately move to post-wedding. Thus begins the strenuous relationship between mother and daughter that gets worse and worse. In Haiti, Libertie lives with her husband and his family including his father, his twin sister, and a woman who is the help but practically raised the siblings after their mother and other siblings passed. Libertie is wary about the living situation immediately but is willing to try for the love of her husband but she increasingly misses home and her mother and does not feel she has a place there even after giving birth to her children.

I enjoyed how this book touched on themes of colorism inside and outside the Black community and I liked how the dynamics of colorism and how she experienced it shifted in her life as she got older and was able to better understand the complexities of colorism within racism. Libertie is a dark-skinned Black woman while her mother and husband were light-skinned to the point of passing if you didn't look too hard so from the mother and daughter relationship to husband and wife, colorism never left her life. I liked that we got to see Libertie interact with and learn from people who were not free born like her and thus have a different outlook on life. I also thought Greenidge did a good job highlighting what it means to be a wife in that era as a Black woman still trying to find her own path no matter what country she is living in. We get to unpack the heavy burden in the supposed responsibility of a woman with a man's heart. I can also appreciate the rough lesson Libertie has to learn the hard way: running away is never a solution to your problems.

That all being said, I can't say I particularly like this book, it was just okay. It took me two months to finish this because I felt no urgency to do so. It wasn't even a matter of the story reaching a peak and then plateauing. This book moved incredibly slow from the start and at a point I just kept getting increasingly uninterested until finally reaching the end which fell super flat for me. Libertie as a character also just wasn't doing it for me after she was no longer 11. I can see how some would really enjoy the poetic prose Greenidge incorporates in her writing style and I've come to learn that I am very picky when it comes to this style but Libertie, unfortunately, missed the mark for me. However, I think those who really love this type of writing through and through would most likely not be as bored as I was and enjoy this book a lot more than I did especially when coupled with the overall themes and message of Libertie's story.

Thank you Algonquin Books and Kaitlyn Greenidge for a copy of this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Such an incredibly beautiful written book. I was very excited going into this story. The premise alone had me intrigued and I was not let down. The mother/daughter relationship was relatable despite circumstances being different and it made it that much easier to want to read.

REVIEW: In Libertie, Kaitlyn Greenidge tackles a great many themes - such as anti-Blackness, misogyny, patriarchy, resistance, self-determination - but the central question remains.

What is freedom, and how do you be free in spaces that aren't meant for you?

I enjoyed how sweeping the story was, taking from Reconstruction Era America to post-revolution Haiti. It reflects on Blackness, and how Black women are perceived in different settings with their own legacies of colorism and patriarchy.

If you're a fan of Brit Bennett or Yaa Gyasi, then I recommend!
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RANDOM MUSINGS: I'm curious to see reflections from Haitian reviewers on how their history and culture are depicted.
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RATING: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Thank you, NetGalley, Kaitlyn Greenidge, and Algonquin Books for the opportunity to read this book!

“In his final moments, as he lay sweating his life away in her arms, he told her to name me Libertie, in honor of the bring, shining future he was coming.”

LIBERTIE
Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge is sure to become a classic. Libertie was born free and her mother in a doctor. Her mother has lighter skin than Libertie and just light enough to be able to be a practicing physician. As a child, her mother helps those who are enslaved escape to freedom. She explores new ways of medicine, that is until one of her patients takes his own life. As she grows, Libertie becomes aware of the vision her mother has for her future. But she is drawn to music and poetry, rather than medicine. She takes advantage of a proposal thinking it will bring her freedom to choose, but she discovers that she is still not free.

“Their bodies are here with us in emancipation, but their minds are not free. Their spirits have not recovered from the degradation of enslavement, despite the many hardships and privations they have suffered to come here.”

LIBERTIE
Freedom (noun): the state of not being imprisoned or enslaved.

But there are many different kinds of enslavement as Kaitlyn Greenidge displays in this coming-of-age novel. Even after emancipation, the color of one’s skin determined their class, what they could do, and not do. —so not freedom. Then there is the status of a Black woman. Then there is the status of a married Black woman. This book can teach readers about the concept of freedom and how easily it can be manipulated.

“I’ve raised you wrong,” Mama said to her reflection. “I’ve raised you all wrong if some white folks being cruel is a surprise to you.” I felt my face go hot with anger again. “I am not surprised by the cruelty, Mama,” I said. “I am surprised we are expected to ignore it, to never mention it, to swim in it as if it’s the oily, smelly harbor water the boys dive into by the wharves.”

LIBERTIE
This book is emotional and inspired by the first Black female doctors in the United States. It is profound and the historical detail is absolutely stunning! There are so many aspects of this book to love. This has one of the best mother-daughter relationship portrayals. The mother wants what is best for her daughter, showing her the hardships she will face but how she believes Libertie should face them. The daughter pushes back, tries to show her mother what her true passion is, then all leading up to the final moment where they both understand the other. I must say, the ending is astounding. It wrapped everything up perfectly and left me utterly breathless.

This book should be read in highschools. I cannot recommend it enough. 5 beautiful stars. Be sure to grab your copy tomorrow!

This ended up being the middle of the road for me. I enjoyed the writing style and the attention to historical detail, but couldn't connect with Libertie and had issues with the pacing. My thoughts are covered in my depth in a Booktube video, linked here: https://youtu.be/sAfMhMjyxvc.

"I saw my mother raise a man from the dead. 'It still didn't help him much, my love,' she told me. But I saw her do it all the same. That's how I knew she was magic."

Libertie is growing up in Reconstruction-era Brooklyn, the daughter of the first black woman doctor in the U.S. Her mother is raising her to go to medical school and come back to practice with her but Libertie wants to choose her own path, eventually coming to realize that although she may have been born free, she doesn't have true freedom. When she meets a young Haitian doctor who promises a marriage where both partners are equal, Libertie jumps at the chance to marry him and move to Haiti. But far away from home and cut off from her mother, she finds herself nowhere close to her husband's partner and questions whether a black woman can ever really be free.

The time and both settings of this book were interesting and I found Greenidge's exploration of colorism compelling - Libertie's mother was able to become a doctor because she was light enough to pass as white but Libertie herself is dark and there are lots of instances where their skin tone or that of other characters comes into play. I also enjoyed the mother/daughter dynamic which is complex and layered but I wish the ending had provided more resolution to their relationship because although this is Libertie's story, her mother was the character I found myself wanting more of.

Ultimately, though, this is a book about what it means to be free not just physically but emotionally and mentally and how sometimes the people you love most, whether they're near or far, dead or alive, can be the ones who keep you shackled.

Thank you to Algonquin Books and NetGalley for an advanced copy to review.

Very character driven. Very heartbreaking to read about the relationship between Libertie and her mom. Tough, slow burn that may not be for everyone.

Many thanks for the advanced copy!

“𝕀 𝕤𝕒𝕨 𝕞𝕪 𝕞𝕠𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣 𝕣𝕒𝕚𝕤𝕖 𝕒 𝕞𝕒𝕟 𝕗𝕣𝕠𝕞 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕕𝕖𝕒𝕕.”

From the very first sentence you know this book is going to have a powerful message.

Libertie’s mother is a doctor, an African-American doctor practicing in the Reconstruction-era. Although Libertie was born free, she witnesses her mother help smuggle men and women to freedom into the North via coffins.

Libertie struggles with why her mother would render services to white women, the same women who turn away from Libertie’s darker skin. Her mother also has high aspirations of Libertie going to school to be a doctor, although Libertie has no inclinations towards the sciences. At school, Libertie has come to love music and looks at life differently than her mother. She wants to be free to make choices, yet she feels she is failing her mother.

When Emmanual Chase, visiting from Haiti, proposes to Libertie, with promises of equality and poetic talk of a new world, Libertie sees it as a way to be free from the constraints of her mother’s expectations and a country still bound by prejudices. But now she finds herself trapped in the family secrets of Emmanuel's home. Now it’s time to make her own choices.

This story feels mystical at times, but it’s rooted in true history. A coming-of-age story that has a young black woman chasing down what true freedom is.

Thank you to @algonquinbooks for this #gifted arc. It goes on sale March 30, 2021.

This book is inspired by the life of one of the first female Black doctors in the United States. This book is beautifully written focusing on free born Libertie Samson and her mother, a doctor. From the time she was a little girl her mother trained her to be a doctor. Her mother had her plan for her but what wasn’t part of the plan is Libertie not wanting the same plan for her life.
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Libertie did not want to always be under her mother’s thumb and has many complicated feelings regarding where she stands in the country regarding race, sex and education. Her mother sends her away to school to study medicine but Libertie is drawn to music and not science. She is drawn to a Haitian man to seek independence from her mother but doesn’t realize she will be subordinate to him.
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This story questions what it means to have a life planned out for you versus physically living out that life. Using the tool of letters written between mother and daughter also displays a complicated mother/daughter relationship. There are so many complications in life that this book covers. Loneliness is a real emotion throughout this book where she states that the “root cause of loneliness is love.” Libertie also questions what it means to be lonely, to be a wife, to be a daughter and do as her mother expects, to be a female and to be a black woman. She struggled with how her mom could treat white women as patients and her mom responds that the color of skin doesn’t matter when all organs are the same.
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Libertie felt so many questions swirling through her mind but life is full of unanswered questions and how you roll with the punches is how you live your life.
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Thank you to #NetGalley and #algonquinbooks for an arc in exchange for an honest review
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This book is out this week! March 30th!

I love historical fiction that’s based on real people, and there’s perhaps no more intriguing of a person than one of the first female, black doctors in the US in the 19th century. This woman raised her daughter in the hopes that she would follow in her footsteps and also become a physician. “Libertie” is told from the daughter’s point of view. So, the set-up for this novel promised to be a really good read. However, there were some disappointing elements that kept this from being a fave of mine.

First, to mention the things that I liked: historical Brooklyn was a really unique and interesting setting and the time period is one that isn’t covered too much in historical fiction. I also loved the complicated relationship between Libertie and her mother. I’m sure anyone with strict, controlling parents can relate. Greenidge also has a really melodical way of writing that reminded me of Tahenisi Coates’ “The Water Dancer.” There’s a little bit of magical realism and folklore sprinkled throughout.

Now, I have to say that all of these elements didn’t quite add up for me. There were stylistic choices that didn’t make sense in my opinion (such as switching to second person perspective for one chapter only). There were also inclusions of another language that weren’t always translated – this took me out of the story when I was trying to really connect to Libertie’s character.

Without giving away too much of the story, I felt like Libertie’s story fell flat when she ventured away from home and from her mother. The section of the book where Libertie goes away to college should have been exciting and fascinating but really just left me wishing that there were more interactions between mother and daughter. I was also really disappointed by the ending. It felt incredibly rushed and it just made me wish that the story had extended to what Libertie’s future would have looked like.

With this subject matter, I thought this book would be a hit for me. But I really just wish the story had felt more organic to me in the end – I definitely struggled with some of Greenidge’s choices.

This book is set in 19th-century King's County (now known as Brooklyn, NY). Dr. Sampson is the first Back female Dr. She has a daughter, Liberty, They live together (father has passed) and Libertie is helping her mother as the practice. She sees from a very young age how differently she is being treated by other because of her dark skin (her mother can pass as white she is so light).

The mother and daughter relationship was very complex, and I could tell that their issues were never going to be solved. Libertie's marriage did not help fix those issues, on the contrary. This book contains lot of topics to be discussed at a book club event. It was quite dumbfounding how childish and immature Libertie was. I couldn't understand any of the decisions she made throughout the book; she was socially awkward even though she was used to see adults come and go in her mother's cabinet and hear them interact from a young age. She has the chance to make decisions for herself, only to regret them later. I was a bit frustrated with the ending. I did not understand her motives and the reasoning behind what she did. I always root for books with strong female protagonists, this one let me down.

Thank you Goodreads and Algonquin Books for this e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the arc.

I read 20% of this and was having a hard time with the formatting of the ebook and just incredibly bored/confused so I stopped reading.

This is truly a coming of age story following Libertie from a young girl to a woman. This book shows how Libertie goes from a child that does everything that is expected of her, to a woman who learns how to stand on her own two feet and speak her mind.

As a child, Libertie seemed to be in the shadows of her mother who was the only Black doctor in town. While Libertie’s mother cares for those that are in need, she’s missing the needs of her daughter. The only interest she has in Libertie is only to groom her to become a doctor like her. Libertie longs for the motherly attention every girl wants and needs. She seeks this attention so much so, she finds herself doing things to make herself sick, seeking that attention at any cost. She also seemed to latch on to anyone that shows a small interest in her.

Libertie finds herself in a marriage where she’s treated, in a sense, the same as her mother treated her. There was an expectation and what seemed to be a hidden agenda. Libertie found herself in a weird situation in a home with her husband and his family where she again followed and did what was expected. It wasn’t until Libertie gained her voice and knew she had a duty and much greater responsibility that she took hold of her life.

I really enjoyed following this story and seeing Libertie grow. I found that I didn’t like Libertie’s mother in the beginning, but then towards the end I sort of understood her. She wanted what she thought was best for Libertie, but went about it all wrong. Although Libertie had a rough road getting to where she was by the end of the story, the things she went through and endured made her who she was by the end and I was all smiles!

I did wish there was more to the story at the end. I would have liked to know the outcome of her seeing her mother again and how her husband handled her new found voice and her actions at the end?

Thank you to Algonquin books and Kaitlyn Greenidge for my gifted copy of this book and partnering with me for this blog tour

3.5 rounded up {Thanks to Algonquin for the gifted book. All opinions are my own.}

Libertie is a solid, slow-burn, atmospheric novel with strong mother-daughter and independence themes. Based loosely off the life of the first free Black practicing physician and her daughter in New York during Reconstruction, this impressive sophomore novel is set in such an interesting time period. Black bodies were (somewhat) being freed, but their minds were often still caged. The dichotomy between these is shown in many different characters, but most prominently in Ben Daisy. Libertie (the daughter) faces her own battle of freedoms as well, in regards to her schooling, her family, and her married life.

Libertie also feels forced to become a doctor like her mother, and rebels in different ways while trying to gain her mother’s approval. Their bond is a tense and silent dance around each other, as neither feels seen.

The last chapter tied the story up rather well, with an interesting shift. I love imagining what might have happened next, and enjoy not having that ending handed to me. Overall, a solid story that I’d recommend!

Kaitlyn Greenidge has written a lovely book with a ton to offer. It touches on race and colorism, the complicated and various degrees and definitions of freedom, loneliness and belonging, acceptance versus the stiflement of trying to live up to the standards and dreams of others, and one of my favorite topics to read about- generational trauma.

Libertie (the book) is loosely based on the true story of Susan Smith McKinney Steward, the first Black woman to earn a medical degree in Reconstruction-era New York. Steward’s daughter, Anna, becomes the inspiration for Libertie (the character).

In the first part of the book, Greenidge does a beautiful job of capturing what it’s like to think and feel like a child. I was sucked in almost immediately, and I think this was my favorite portion of the novel.

Certain passages took me right back to being a kid:

“I’d broken a stick off the mulberry bush, so young it had resisted the pull of my fist. I’d had to work for it.”

I distinctly remember playing outdoors and getting ticked off when a branch or a flower or a leaf that I wanted didn’t break off easily for me. And then this line, that made me think about the way my own kid processes the world:

“To understand a ghost is to have an understanding of time that is not possible for a child.”

And this line, the secret inner thoughts of a girl imagining the environment that a spirit might live in:

“I did not think a woman who could drown a man in her arms lived in anything as sweet as fresh water. Her domain was brackish. She would live in salt.”

There were so many pieces of writing that just blew me away- gorgeous observations of the world that were so completely accurate, but phrased in a way that I never would have thought of, like:

“...perhaps women’s voices in harmony were like some sort of flintstone sparking, or like the hot burst of air that comes through a window, billowing the curtains, before rain.”

And:

“It is a strange thing, to see something you have imagined over and over again finally acted out in front of you. It is almost like a kind of death, a loss of something, that the thing is not as you had thought it would be.”

I think there are so many important things going on in this book, that there is something for everyone no matter what stage of life you’re in. For me, my biggest joy in life is my relationship with my son. For that reason, I was most drawn to sections that were about Libertie and her mother. While this complicated relationship is present in some way on every page of the book, there were a few standouts to me. In one passage, Libertie (jealous of her mother’s medical attention towards others) acts out to get some of that attention for herself:

“With the same unconscious cunning all young children possess around their mothers, I had devised the best way to get her attention—make her relive one of her most painful memories—the sick little-girl body, limp in bed, the small gasps for breath, the throat closing, the skin flushing from brown to a deep velvet and then emptying out into gray. What kind of daughter who loves her mother does something like that?”

But my favorite lines were those that revealed how Libertie’s mother really felt about her. Normally not particularly affectionate, there were times when the love peeked through:

“The only good poem I’ve ever written is you. A daughter is a poem. A daughter is a kind of psalm. You, in the world, responding to me, is the song I made. I cannot make another.”

The letters that she wrote to Libertie after she moved to Haiti were very moving. And finally, Libertie seems to understand the complexities of the relationship after she gives birth herself:

“Being a mother means being someone’s god, if only briefly. This is known, I think. But they are my gods, too. They are my country now.”

An arrow right to my heart! Great read.

(Also, it would be terrible to not mention how amazing the cover design of this book is- beautiful!)

I received a temporary digital advanced copy of Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge from NetGalley, Algonquin Books, and the author in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I was originally drawn to this novel by its gorgeous cover. The novel itself, a Freeborn Black girl, coming of age in the mid to late-1800s, whose mother is a doctor solified that this was a must read. The beginning started off extremely well. I enjoyed Libertie's perspective of her mother and her career, the general world around her and its people. Nevertheless, the novel quickly fell flat after that. Libertie seems to be extremely lost throughout the remainder of the story. She has no idea who she is or who she wants to be, which she and everyone else (except her mother) can see, and yet she rarely makes any decisions to improve her situation. I found it extremely difficult to like most of the main characters and frustrating when everyone just seemed all over the place, in turn making me feel discombobulated. In addition, there were whole words or phrases missing every few pages increased my confusion.

Everything I want to say has been said very well in other reviews so I will not waste your time, but I feel as if the author was trying very hard to touch upon too many topics and may have done herself an injustice by doing so.

Thank you to Netgalley for the e ARC.

“I saw my mother raise a man from the dead.” Is the powerful first line of Greenidge’s second novel. Libertie is the daughter of a black female doctor. Born before the American Civil War, Libertie struggles with becoming the doctor her mother wishes her to be. Her mother, Dr. Sampson is light-skinned, making it easier for white women to accept her doctoring skills. Libertie is dark-skinned, making life different for her. She fights her mother’s wishes, and when Emmanuel Chase, a young doctor who has come to Brooklyn to apprentice under her mother’s tutelage, Libertie falls in love with him and moves to his home in Haiti. She fails to find the black homeland she’d been expecting and continues to struggle with her place in the world. This is a departure from historical fiction books by spending more time looking at how historically Blacks themselves placed value on their skin tones rather than on the inner strengths of the people. The characters, as well, are different beginning with the man, Mr. Ben, who is raised from the dead by Libertie’s mother. He, too, is a lost soul, whether from mental illness or from a true sorrow at the loss of a woman he loved. There are some black college students who are afraid to perform for white audiences. They do not want to share the pain of their singing with people who wouldn’t understand. Over and over, Libertie deals with the issue of “what does it mean to be free.”