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Blonde Roots cover art

Blonde Roots

By: Bernardine Evaristo
Narrated by: Charlotte Beaumont,Ben Arogundade
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Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

Imagine if the transatlantic slave trade was reversed.

Imagine Africans the masters and Europeans their slaves....

Now meet young Doris, living in a sleepy English cottage. One day she is kidnapped and put aboard a slave ship bound for the New World. On a strange tropical island, Doris is told she is an ugly, stupid savage. Her only purpose in life is to please her mistress. Then, as personal assistant to Bwana, Chief Kaga Konata Katamba I, she sees the horrors of the sugarcane fields. Slaves are worked to death under the blazing sun. But though she lives in chains, Doris dreams of escape - of returning home to England and those she loves....

©2020 Bernardine Evaristo (P)2020 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

"A phenomenal book. It is so ingenious and so novel. Think The Handmaid's Tale meets Noughts and Crosses with a bit of Jonathan Swift and Lewis Carroll thrown in. This should be thought of as a feminist classic." (Women's Prize for Fiction Podcast) 

"A bold and brilliant game of counterfactual history. Evaristo keep[s] her wit and anger at a spicy simmer throughout." (Daily Telegraph)

"So human and real. Re-imagines past and present with refreshing humour and intelligence." (Guardian

What listeners say about Blonde Roots

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    5 out of 5 stars

Brilliant reversal of historical events

If you are reading this you are probably aware that Bernadine Evaristo reimagines a world where it is the technologies of people of colour, located in the Africa continent, where the evolutionary story begins, as she constructs people from that continent as superior to all the other so-called races and it is whyte people, originating from the continent of Europe, who are at the bottom of the evolutionary pile. This means of course that white readers get a taste of enslavement from the perspective of the whyte people from Europa and, in that respect, Evaristo pulls no punches in her detailed descriptions of life on a slave ship and on the plantations.
This is a very creative and clever reversal of historical events and Evaristo goes a long way towards convincing us that the world is very different to the one In which we are currently living. It feels as if a simple geographical twist of fate is what enables the huge shift in the evolution of humankind. Some of the most chilling chapters are the ones in the centre of the book, where the whole horror of scientific racism is reimagined as a process whereby blak people are placed at the top of the evolutionary cycle and whyte people at the bottom, through a whole process of measurement and so-called anthropometrics. It’s a very scary reminder of the scientific racism of the 19th and 20th centuries and every so-called scientist should be forced to read this book, as should every schoolchild, both in Europe and in the United States. This book is an excellent introduction to the horrors of the enslavement of millions of humans, especially if you have bothered to read about these histories is before.

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3 people found this helpful

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    4 out of 5 stars

Good but felt short-changed

Great concept for a story and supported with plenty of detail - albeit making for uncomfortable reading in places. Let down somewhat in the telling by the male narrator - too laboured - I actually found it less irritating when the audio speed was increased to x1.2 for the male voice sections.

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2 people found this helpful

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A feat

It made me laugh and cringe, and it didn't let me look away. Superb narration.

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A fascinating switch up

Personally, I loved this book. The world the author built was incredibly well done and it was really interesting to think about the other aspects of life that the slave trade had on society, such as the westernised standard of beauty. I loved the way to biological basis for slavery was put across in this book to really demonstrate how anyone can justify slavery if they try and find reasons.

The books ending was a bit disappointing, but the overall book was a great listen.
Anyone saying they don't really see the point in it needs to try and think about the wider implications this book is trying to make.

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1 person found this helpful

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A Must Read/Listen

Absolutely loved this.
If you're white and ever wondered how you'd feel as a slave. Read this. If you're white and haven't thought about it, then you should definitely read this book.
It's poignant, hard hitting and has speckles of humour.
Bernadine writes so wel, the whole book just flows.
Read this book

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  • Al
  • 02-05-22

simply swapping the races makes you think

the simple device of swapping the races, amazingly, has a huge effect on how you understand this horendous chapter of british history. well written, the story explores many of the horrific realities of the western slave trade.

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Should be mandatory reading

This book should be mandatory reading in every British school, colleges and university. Wow. Wow. Wow.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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Disappointing

For a writer I normally enjoy, this book was disappointing. She did not make good use of an original idea, i.e. reversal of the black and white roles in slavery. I don’t think anything new was said about slavery, which any decent person knows is and was wrong, regardless of the perpetrators. Ben Arogundade reads well and with a dignified tone. Charlotte Beaumont’s reading is too flat.

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A important, hard book

I knew in general terms the history of the real Atlantic slave trade before reading this, but however appalling the facts, they do not pull on our emotions like stories do. This book will make you feel something of the pain of those thousands ripped from their homes and loved ones, those who lived and died never knowing freedom, all for the sake of satisfying other men's greed. It's a hard book to read, both not exactly because of what it depicts, but because of knowing that it mirrors reality so closely. However, refusing to acknowledge the past will make it less true, and we must know our past in order to make the future better. So, read it.

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Excellent and thought provoking.

A really poignant re-imagining of the abominable slave trade. Characters brilliantly created. Satirically very clever.

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