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Start giftingSomeone Knows My Name
Aminata Diallo (“an amazing literary creation,” Literary Review of Canada) is the beguiling heroine of Lawrence Hill’s SOMEONE KNOWS MY NAME. In it, Hill exquisitely imagines the tale of an eighteenth-century woman’s life, spanning six decades and three continents. The fascinating story that Hill tells is a work of the soul and the imagination. Aminata is a character who will stir listeners, from her kidnapping from Africa through her journeys back and forth across the ocean.
Enslaved on a South Carolina plantation, Aminata works in the indigo fields and as a midwife. When she is bought by an entrepreneur from Charleston, she is torn from friends and family. The chaos of the Revolutionary War allows her to escape. In British-held Manhattan, she helps pen the Book of Negroes, a list of blacks rewarded for wartime service to the King with safe passage to Nova Scotia. During her travels in Canada, Sierra Leone, and England, Aminata strives for her freedom and that of her people–even when it comes at a price.
In this captivating novel, Hill portrays one woman’s remarkable spirit and strength in the face of adversity, and he brings to life crucial and little-known chapters in world history.
Lawrence Hill is the author of several novels, including Someone Knows My Name, which won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize. It was also nominated in the United States for the Huston Wright Legacy Award. In 2015, Hill was appointed to the Order of Canada "for his contributions as an author and activist who tells the stories of Canada's black community and of women and girls in Africa." A graduate of the Writing Seminars at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, he lives in Ontario, Canada.
Adenrele Ojo is a native Philadelphian who was born in Brooklyn, New York, and currently resides in Los Angeles. First trained as a dancer as a little girl, she went on to study as a part of Philadanco’s Training Program; later she received her Bachelor of the Arts in theater from Hunter College in New York and honed her skills at the William Esper Studio, studying Meisner under the auspices of Maggie Flanigan. Nominated for an L.A. Stage Alliance Ovation Award for Featured Actress in a Play for her role as Martha Pentecost in the Fountain Theater’s 2006 production of August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Adenrele Ojo, theatre brat (her dad, John E. Allen, Jr. was Founder & Artistic Director of Freedom Theatre, the oldest African American theater in Pennsylvania) is no stranger to the stage. In 2010 she performed in the Fountain Theatre’s production of The Ballad of Emmett Till by Ifa Bayeza, directed by Shirley Jo Finney, which won the 2010 L.A. Stage Alliance Ovation Award & the Los Angeles Drama Critics Award for Best Ensemble. Other plays include August Wilson’s Jitney and Freedom Theatre’s own Black Nativity (2007), where she played Mary.
Lawrence Hill is the author of several novels, including Someone Knows My Name, which won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize. It was also nominated in the United States for the Huston Wright Legacy Award. In 2015, Hill was appointed to the Order of Canada "for his contributions as an author and activist who tells the stories of Canada's black community and of women and girls in Africa." A graduate of the Writing Seminars at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, he lives in Ontario, Canada.
Adenrele Ojo is a native Philadelphian who was born in Brooklyn, New York, and currently resides in Los Angeles. First trained as a dancer as a little girl, she went on to study as a part of Philadanco’s Training Program; later she received her Bachelor of the Arts in theater from Hunter College in New York and honed her skills at the William Esper Studio, studying Meisner under the auspices of Maggie Flanigan. Nominated for an L.A. Stage Alliance Ovation Award for Featured Actress in a Play for her role as Martha Pentecost in the Fountain Theater’s 2006 production of August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Adenrele Ojo, theatre brat (her dad, John E. Allen, Jr. was Founder & Artistic Director of Freedom Theatre, the oldest African American theater in Pennsylvania) is no stranger to the stage. In 2010 she performed in the Fountain Theatre’s production of The Ballad of Emmett Till by Ifa Bayeza, directed by Shirley Jo Finney, which won the 2010 L.A. Stage Alliance Ovation Award & the Los Angeles Drama Critics Award for Best Ensemble. Other plays include August Wilson’s Jitney and Freedom Theatre’s own Black Nativity (2007), where she played Mary.
Reviews
Hill's depiction of [Aminata's] journey to freedom is a powerful tale of pride and perseverance.—Sara Nelson, Oprah.comA masterpiece, daring and impressive in its geographic, historical and human reach.—Globe and Mail
Lawrence Hill's hugely impressive historical work is completely engrossing and deserves a wide, international readership.—Delia Jarrett-Macauley, Washington Post
With grace and compassion, Hill populates true and harrowing experience with an authentic hero—just as good historical fiction requires.—Jennifer Berman, Bookforum
Astonishing in scope, humanity and beauty, this is one of those very rare novels in which the deep joy of reading transcends its time and place. Like To Kill a Mockingbird, Someone Knows My Name lets readers experience a life, one footstep at a time, beside an unforgettable protagonist. —Eileen Charbonneau, Historical Novels Review, Editor's Choice
Stunning, wrenching and inspiring.... Hill handles the pacing and tension masterfully... [his] book is a harrowing, breathing tour de force.—Publishers Weekly, starred review Expand reviews
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