The Wedding Gift by Marlen Suyapa Bodden Review!!

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press; 1 edition (September 24, 2013)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1250026385
• ISBN-13: 978-1250026385
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• About The Wedding Gift
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When prestigious plantation owner Cornelius Allen gives his daughter Clarissa’s hand in marriage, she takes with her a gift: Sarah—her slave and her half-sister.  Raised by an educated mother, Clarissa is not a proper southern belle she appears to be with ambitions of loving who she chooses and Sarah equally hides behind the façade of being a docile house slave as she plots to escape. Both women bring these tumultuous secrets and desires with them to their new home, igniting events that spiral into a tale beyond what you ever imagined possible and it will leave you enraptured until the very end.

Told through alternating viewpoints of Sarah and Theodora Allen, Cornelius’ wife, Marlen Suyapa Bodden's The Wedding Gift is an intimate portrait that will leave readers breathless.

About the Author

Marlen Suyapa Bodden is a lawyer at The Legal Aid Society in New York City. She has more than two decades' experience representing poor people and low-wage and immigrant workers, many of whom are severely underpaid, if paid at all.

She drew on her knowledge of modern and historical slavery, human trafficking, and human rights abuses to write The Wedding Gift, her first novel, which will be globally published on September 24, 2013 by St. Martin's Press.

Marlen is a graduate of New York University School of Law and Tufts University and has a Doctor of Laws (honorary) from the University of Rhode Island.

http://www.marlenbodden.com/ 

My Thoughts
The Wedding Gift by Marlen Suyapa Bodden is a story about slavery in antebellum Alabama. Half sisters, Clarissa, daughter of plantation owner, and Sarah, light skinned house slave owned by Clarissa's father. Even though Sarah is a slave in the household, she and her mother are treated like family.Slaves were not to be educated, which was the norm for this period in American history but Sarah is very intelligent and easily picks up reading and writing when Clarissa is receiving her lessons. The thinking was that if a slave was educated, they may rebel against the restraints of slavery and attempt to run away. 

When Clarissa is married off to a man not of her choosing, Sarah is sent along with her to be her maid. Women during this time were married off to the highest bidder if you will, it all has to do with how much money and property that will come along with the bride. Life is not what she thought it was going to be with her husband and his family but Clarissa is happy to have Sarah with her, even though unbeknownst to anyone Sarah has other plans for her own future. This is also a story of Theodora, Clarissa's mother and the abuse she suffers at the hands of her husband, Cornelius Allen.

This is a story that not only tells of slavery, runaway slaves and the abuse of women's and their human rights that were the norm for the time. A book filled with emotion, loyalty and determination of the characters to make their lives better by doing what is necessary to survive. Each chapter is alternated between the characters and in each voice we learn about the determination and vulnerabilities that the women face on a daily basis. I have to say that I did not see the ending coming but found it appropriate nevertheless  I enjoyed the book immensely and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading this period in American history.

I received a copy of this book for review and was not monetarily compensated for my review.