Product Description

'for all its restraint...A Mercy is a furious novel, a volley of anger, contempt and sorrow'

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6563 in Books
• Published on: 2009-06-04
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 176 pages

Review
`a series of bleakly beautiful vignettes that catch at the heart' --Marie Claire

'Morrison's prose is richly poetic' --Daily Mail

`Must Read' --Sunday Times

`Toni Morrison has done it again'
--TLS

'full of such scrupulous ... amplifications, Morrison's sedulous attention to details ... one measure of her sophistication as a writer.' --The New York Review of Books

`Morrison's prose is confident and secure, her language masterful...This is another penetrating and profoundly disquieting view of America's past'
--Historical Novels Review

Review
`Unsettling, exquisitely written, and deeply moving, it's an amazing piece of work'

Review
'A Mercy is a furious novel, a volley of anger, contempt and sorrow'

Customer Reviews

"I don't think God knows who we are. I think He would like us, if He knew us, but I don't think He knows about us."
(4.5 stars) Continuing themes that she has been developing since the start of her career, Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison creates an intense and involving philosophical, Biblical, and feminist novel set in the Atlantic colonies between 1682 and 1690. Her impressionistic story traces slavery from its early roots, using unique voices--African, Native American, and white--while moving back and forth in time. The primary speaker is Florens, a 16-year-old African slave, who tells the reader at the outset that this is a confession, "full of curiosities," and that she has committed a bloody, once-in-a-lifetime crime. In a flashback to 1682, we learn that when Florens was only eight years old, her mother suggested to the Maryland planter who owned the family, that Florens be given to New York farmer Jacob Vaark to settle a debt. Florens never understands why she was abandoned by her mother.

Florens lives and works for the next eight years on Vaark's rural New York farm. Lina, a Native American, who works with her, tells in a parallel narrative how she became one of a handful of survivors of a plague that killed her tribe. Vaark's wife Rebekkah describes leaving England for New York to be married to a man she has never seen. The deaths of their subsequent children are devastating, and Vaark is hoping that eight-year-old Florens will help alleviate Rebekkah's loneliness. Vaark, himself an orphan and poorhouse survivor, describes his journeys from New York to Maryland and Virginia, commenting on the role of religion in the culture of the different colonies, along with their attitudes toward slavery.

All these characters are bereft of their roots, struggling to survive in an alien environment filled with danger and disease. When smallpox threatens Rebekkah's life in 1692, Florens, now sixteen, is sent to find a black freedman who has some knowledge of herbal medicines. Her journey is dangerous and ultimately proves to be the turning point in her life.

Morrison examines the roots of racism going back to slavery's earliest days, providing glimpses of the various religious practices of the time, and showing how all the women are victimized. They are "of and for men," people who "never shape the world, The world shapes us." As the women journey toward self-enlightenment, Morrison describes their progress in often Biblical cadences, and by the end of this novel, the reader understands what "a mercy" really means. An intense and thought-provoking look at various forms of slavery from their beginnings, this short novel has an epic scope, one which admirers of Morrison will celebrate for its intense thematic development, even as they may somewhat regret its sacrifice of fully developed characters. Mary Whipple

Sula
Beloved (Vintage Classics)
Jazz
Song of Solomon
Love
Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination

Journey into American Past to Understand American Present
In her latest novel Toni Morrison takes us back to the late 17th century America. The plot gives her an opportunity to present America in the making, there is no US yet, there are colonies, each somewhat different in their culture, religion or attitude to slavery. Morrison adroitly shapes the plot in such a way as to give the reader at least an impression of the variety that once was America, sending her characters on distant voyages. The differences are the most clearly visible in the opposition between Maryland and New York yet the choice of character also helps Morrison to stress the diversity of American roots.
And yet "A Mercy" is not just a historical novel. The setting is important but Morrison seems much more interested in her characters. This concentration is reflected in the form of the book - we get to know about the events from the characters in a series of monologues which culminate in the final monologue of Florens' mother which ties some of the book's loose ends and answers some of its haunting questions.
Each of the monologues comes from a completely different character - a slave, a native American, a Dutch etc. - this variety is almost incredible but serves to add a depth to the book, broadens the view the reader gets.
As usual in Morrison's fiction the characters are mostly women. As a result the book to some degree fails as a HIStory book, it is much more of a HERstory book, offering the reader a selection of points of view usually missing in more traditional history writing both fictional and scholarly.
In short: another great book from a Nobel-prize winning novelist.

Wouldn't bother
This book had great potential and I was looking forward to reading it. However I really struggled with, well, everything. I did not like the style of writing and found myself speed-reading and not taking anything in. I have given this book out and have found that it is soon returned to me as the borrower has had the same problems as me. Sorry to Toni Morrison but I would certainly not recommend this to anyone and I only gave one star as I had to give it something. Don't waste your money.