EXODUSTER

An enslaved 13-year-old in Louisiana escapes into the unknown after the enslaver’s death in King’s novel.

The Boy, who remains nameless, is enslaved at the Conner household in rural Louisiana in 1846. There are two other Black people on the property, Lily, who is a mother figure and friend to the Boy, and Tom, an ornery old man. Lily acknowledges that Elizabeth Conner and her son, Ian, are less cruel enslavers than others; however, she is all too aware of how slavery has torn families apart. The Boy has some education, but he is beaten if he disagrees with a white person (“He remembered a lifetime of this type of contradiction. He was taught to read but forbidden to tell anyone”). Mrs. Conner dies, and soon Ian is mysteriously found murdered. Lily takes the Boy and runs, knowing they will be blamed for the crime, but a smooth-talking man promises them freedom if they board a ship. Unfortunately, the Boy finds himself on an island with a tobacco crop, and he, along with many others, are still enslaved and forced to work the fields. The operation is led by the Gator Boys, a ruthlessly violent Black group. As the Boy grows, he despairs of ever finding Lily and worries about what he has become; he’s now one of the overseers. King’s novel excels at portraying the absurdities and horrors of slavery through his young protagonist, who is indoctrinated into the system but still intellectually curious. It’s a raw, brutal tale but also one that captures brief moments of joy and the emotional longing felt by those who have been separated. Some aspects of the novel are uneven, like flashbacks to develop characters that have already died, and a principal character disappears for too long. As a work of historical fiction, though, the narrative has a strong degree of plausibility.

A striking, painful novel about one young man’s struggle to survive with his soul intact.