With a story that doesn’t shy away from the horrors of slavery, this book is a visceral read from the start. We follow an enslaved man named Willie as he wants to do anything to save his people - and especially his beloved Gertie - from the horrors of their daily life. When conventional means of escape fail, he discovers a much bloodier solution to his problem - and yet, as we read we can clearly see who is a monster and who is not. A novel about freedom, revenge, and using whatever means necessary to save yourself. 

This book captured my attention from the start, and I spent a great deal of the book waiting for the well-deserved revenge to occur. Every character has a distinct voice, and we see the many faceted sides of the abuse those who are enslaved are forced to endure - and how each of them decides to survive living it. 

The biggest issue I believe I had with this book is that once the knowledge of the “vampires” was discovered, the story still lingered on for a long while before anything significant was done using their abilities. As well as the fact that much of this book, especially near the end, felt like it was written more as a movie description as opposed to a novel. (The very last scene comes to mind as being a bit extremely cliche.) Where - if how the ending is intended to leave room for a sequel, where our main characters then rescue the rest of their people from the plantations they are enslaved, I would be less critical. However, if this was intended to be a one-off novel, then the open-endedness of the ending, and especially of the very last scene, feels a bit too “movie-made” for me, as opposed to how reading a book is supposed to feel. 

A huge trigger warning for: explicit descriptions of SA, SA of a child, extreme violence (for instance, someone being torn apart by dogs), racial slurs/racism, sexual abuse