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“Beautiful, haunting, mesmerizing, yet disturbing in the way that pure history is itself disturbing; people are not evil, but they treat one another in evil ways. I wanted to hold Sacagewea and Baptiste close to my heart…”–Goodreads
Fashionista Piranha Features Museum of Human Beings “Because A Good Book Is The Perfect Fashion Accessory”
“Colin Sargent has pulled this child–usually regulated to a footnote in a book about Lewis, Clark or his famous mother–out of the past and written Baptiste’s life story in his first novel…interesting…and quite entertaining to read.”–Fashionista Piranha Review, Book Blog For the full review, visit www..fashion-piranha.livejournal.com
ForeWord Magazine, May/June 2009 issue, page 26
“Different Worlds: First Time Novelists Transport Readers”
How many novels by first-time authors are published each year? Do not seek to know the answers,
Grasshopper, but to understand the questions. What does “published” mean these days, or even “author”?
Is James Patterson an author? Is Ron Blagojevich? Ah, let’s not dwell. Here, we’ve collected a bookshelf of
literary fiction by writers who can now, in all seriousness, call themselves authors.
Museum of Human Beings
History buffs and elementary-aged children
alike are enthralled with the Corps
of Discovery’s 1803 transcontinental
crossing undertaken by Meriwether
Lewis, William Clark, and crew. Scholars have increasingly
recognized the young Shoshone woman Sacajawea
as a pivotal leader in this expedition. Here, Jean-
Baptiste Charbonneau, the infant on Sacajawea’s back,
takes his own personal voyage of self-discovery as he is
fostered by Clark in St. Louis, supported by Duke Paul
of Württemberg in Europe, and haunted by his mother’s
spirit in the American wilderness.
Playwright and poet Colin Sargent resides in
Portland, Maine, where he founded Portland magazine.
His sophisticated use of language permeates this
tale. For example, the color blue is used to create a
path and stimulate memory: From the descriptions
of the first sighting of the Pacific Ocean to the final
viewing of an arrowhead around a baby’s neck, the
color travels alongside Baptiste. “[Sacajawea’s] rib
cage, so like a bird’s, bore the blue stigmata of your
father’s most recent attentions,” Clark tells Baptiste.
Sacajawea’s blue Lemhi beaded belt indicates her
descent from a royal family, and Baptiste’s baby sister
Lizette is wrapped in the same blue cloth that had
originally warmed him.
Sargent explores language in another way at the
opening of each chapter by displaying a Plains Indian
sign language word along with its description. For
example, to indicate “alone,” a person should “…hold
right hand palm up in front of neck. Move outward in
sinuous motion.”
As Baptiste roams figuratively and literally, his
two father-figures torment him: the distant William
Clark, whom he initially strives to emulate, and the
alcoholic Toussaint Charbonneau, whom he cannot
escape. The age-old struggle to find true identity by
testing different worlds becomes unique in this debut
novel that belongs with the best of historical fiction.
Beth Hemke Shapiro
The Local, Steamboat Springs, Colorado
Get Lit, by Michelle Dover
“The Amazing Adventures of Human Beings”
Yes, yes, we all love the founding fathers of the United States of America. Their biographies always have a hold list at the library when they arrive from the publishers. Authors do a brilliant job of recreating these men’s lives through the plethora of documents left behind.
Ask yourself: Was my great, great, great grandma perched on the end of her rocking chair worshipping the founding fathers? Was that same grandma working her knitting needles impatiently waiting for news about their latest speech? Remember that great grandma couldn’t even vote, maybe grandma couldn’t even read, maybe grandma didn’t have access to news and information. Maybe grandma was doing the laundry on a rock in the river.
In the last decade more and more readers have turned to historical fiction to fill in the gaps left in history. People want to see their working class immigrant family, their African-Americans ancestors in and out of slavery, women and children.
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