Kindred

by Octavia E. Butler

Ebook, 2003

Library's rating

Library's review

I didn't know anything about this book before reading it, which made the complete surprise of discovering it is a time-travel science-fiction tale even more delightful. A young black woman, living in California in the 1970s, finds herself "called back" to the antebellum 19th century whenever a

young white boy's life is in danger. Dana figures out that the boy is one of her ancestors, and she must save his life so that he has a chance to grow up and have the child who will become her grandmother's grandmother. And she has to do all this while navigating her way as a free black woman in the slave-owning state of Maryland.

The scenes when Dana is forced to confront the reality of black lives in slave-holding America are incredibly powerful. Though she is not technically a slave, she also can't prove that she is free, as she has no papers. She can only escape back to the 1970s when she fears that her life is in immediate danger, but she has no control over when the reckless Rufus might "call" her back again, which happens several times over the years as he grows to be a man.

Complicating Dana's situation is the white man she is married to in the 20th century, who accidentally travels back in time with her on one of her trips and then gets stranded there for five years. It's disturbing to see the ways that both of them are changed by their experiences in the 19th century, and the reader might well wonder what the long-term effects of the experiences will be for them and their life together.

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Description

Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. Rufus, the white son of a plantation owner, is drowning, and Dana has been summoned across the years to save him. After this first summons, Dana is drawn back, again and again, to the plantation to protect Rufus and ensure that he will grow to manhood and father the daughter who will become Dana's ancestor. Yet each time Dana's sojourns become longer and more dangerous, until it is uncertain whether or not her life will end, long before it has even begun.