The Book of Lost Friends
Louisiana, 1875: In the tumultuous aftermath of Reconstruction, three young women set off as unwilling companions on a perilous quest. For heiresses Lavinia and Juneau Jane, the journey is one of inheritance and financial desperation, but for Hannie, torn from her mother and siblings before slavery's end, the pilgrimage westward reignites an agonizing question. Could her long-lost family still be out there?
Louisiana, 1987: Arriving in Augustine, Louisiana, first-year teacher Benedetta Silva finds herself teaching students whose poverty-stricken lives she can scarcely comprehend. The town is impossibly set in its ways, suspicious of new ideas and new people. But amid the gnarled live oaks and ancient plantation homes lies the century-old history of three young women, a long-ago journey, and a hidden book that could change everything.
This is the second of Lisa Wingate's novels that I have read and again it deals with true events in America's history.
The Lost Friends was a column in a newspaper that was read out in the black churches in the hope of someone recognising the names and being able to reconnect these families broken and separated by enslavement.
There are two time lines, 1875 in Louisiana where ten years after the end of the Civil War and the abolishment of slavery, former slave Hannie Gossett is still working for her master but this time to earn her self and adopted family a piece of land to call their own. But the master has gone missing along with the proof of the time and money earned to gain their piece of land.
When Hannie and the Master's two daughters, Lavinia, by his marriage and Juneau Jane from his mistress, set off to find him things don't go the way they planned.
The second time period is 1987 and a first time young school teacher, Benny Silva, starts work in an impoverished Louisiana school. Benny has to deal with children who are uninspired, very often don't attend because either there is no one to make sure they attend or they are looking after younger siblings. She also has to deal with governors who, if they have children, are sent to a different and better supplied school. They want to keep the school poor.
When Benny decides to teach them about their history she is met with resistance from the governers.
A slow book to get into but worth the effort to keep reading.
Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for my ARC in return for an honest review.