Adult Fiction
Reviewed by Angela-Manitou Branch Administrator
Breaking the Maafa Chain tells the story of the daughters of an African chief, Fatmata and her little sister, Salimatu, who are captured during a raid on their village by the slave-trader, King Gezo. Gezo sells Fatmata, who is then shipped to a plantation in Louisiana, but he plans to sacrifice Salimatu. She is saved by a British naval officer, Captain Forbes, when King Gezo, hoping to make peace with the British who are trying to stop the slave trade, decides to make Salimatu a gift to Queen Victoria. Captain Forbes takes Salimatu, who he renames Sarah, to England to live with his family, where she becomes Queen Victoria's godchild.
The story follows the very different lives of the two sisters. Fatmata (renamed Faith) leads a hard life, is abused and mistreated, while Sarah lives a life of privilege. Sarah often visits the Queen's palaces and plays with the royal princes and princesses. She is educated with the Forbes children and treated like one of the family, while the newspapers write stories about the "Black Princess" that make her something of a celebrity.
When Faith's new Master and Mistress bring her to England to care for their infant son, Faith dreams of finding her sister. Although she knows nothing of Sarah's new name or life, she does know that she is in England. During the voyage, Faith meets a freed slave named Absalom and they fall in love. He agrees to try and help her find Sarah, but after searching, they have almost given up when Faith catches a glimpse of her sister at the Great Exhibition in London, however, she is unable to contact her.
Absalom finally persuades Faith to run away and marry him, after which they will take a ship to Freetown in Sierra Leone, the British colony established for liberated slaves. But things go horribly wrong for them, as they do for Sarah.
When news comes that Captain Forbes has died at sea, the Forbes family must move to live with a relative in Scotland, but Queen Victoria has other plans for Sarah, who she insists will be returned to Africa.
This book is loosely based on real events. Sarah Forbes Bonetta did exist. She was the daughter of an African chief and did become Queen Victoria's godchild and was known as the "Black Princess." The book's historical endnotes say that Maafa is the Swahili word for disaster, but it has come to mean "African Holocaust" and refers to the violence towards and displacement of the African people during the slave trade era.
This book has an engaging storyline, if you can ignore the apparent complete lack of editing and proofreading that, for me, made reading it somewhat irritating.
This book offers a glimpse into the rich, happy lives of the sisters growing up in their African village before being hurled into new lives that could not have been more different, but were both alien, painful and less free in many ways.
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