{"product_id":"kindred-by-octavia-butler","title":"Kindred by Octavia Butler","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"I lost an arm on my last trip home. My left arm.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eDana's 26th birthday celebration ends when she's ripped from 1976 California and thrust onto a Maryland slave plantation in 1815. Her mission: keep alive the white boy who will grow up to assault her ancestor--because without him, she'll never be born.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eEvery trip back grows more dangerous. Dana feels the lash, wears the chains, endures the daily terror that defined millions of lives. She can't just read about slavery's horrors--she lives them, bleeds from them, nearly breaks under them.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eButler doesn't let you observe from a safe distance. You're trapped in Dana's skin as she navigates impossible choices: submit to survive, or resist and risk everything. You'll feel her desperation as she fights to preserve her humanity while the plantation's brutality threatens to consume her.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThis isn't historical fiction--it's time travel that cuts straight to the bone of American racism. Butler pioneered the neo-slavery narrative that inspired Colson Whitehead's \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eUnderground Railroad\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e and Ta-Nehisi Coates's \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eWater Dancer\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e. But \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eKindred\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e remains unmatched in its raw power to make slavery's legacy feel immediate, personal, and inescapable.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eYou'll finish this book changed. Dana's story will lodge itself in your chest and refuse to leave. You'll understand, in ways textbooks never taught you, how the past lives in our present--and why that matters more than ever.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\"Where stories about American slavery are often gratuitous, reducing its horror to explicit violence and brutality, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eKindred\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e is controlled and precise\" ( \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\"Reading Octavia Butler taught me to dream big, and I think it's absolutely necessary that everybody have that freedom and that willingness to dream.\"\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003e--N. K. Jemisin\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48294363136228,"sku":null,"price":17.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0723\/5505\/3796\/files\/9780807083697.jpg?v=1773428984","url":"https:\/\/maplemercantilebooks.com\/products\/kindred-by-octavia-butler","provider":"Maple Mercantile Book \u0026 Gift Shop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}